Ten oz

I agree. However in the case of hallucinations there does appear to be a miss. People can see that which isn't there, hear sounds that are not present (at least not measurable), etc. While those individuals are unable to distinguish between the mind and external world in the moment we do have other means of measuring reality. Going back and listening to records, watching video, considering input from other people, etc. Can reveal to individuals that what the experienced wasn't real/external. Of course that individual is still making that realization with their own mind which is why I referred degrees of accuracy moment to moment. This, of course, assumes our interpretation of the world is ever anything more that an illusion.

I too am a lucid dreamer. I too have had dreams where people and or places in my dreams have established histories. So this topic is potentially interesting me. However I think it should be couched within understand the basic premise. It is too huge of a leap to connect it with evolution and what not in advance of understanding anything about it. Assuming you believe your own mind creates the entirety of your dreams how and or why do you think it creates backstories within dreams?

People with mental disorders like Schizophrenia can have visual and audible hallucinations. To lesser extends most people are capable of hallucinations under various conditions (fatigue, hunger, etc). The mind interprets what it can of the external world but can be wrong (what others would collectively agree is or can be measured as wrong). As such I think there is a distinction to be made. The mind interprets the external but with what degree of accuracy various person to person and moment to moment. I think we have all at one point been walking, anticipated a drop from the curb to the street, taken a step adjusting for the drop, and then stumbled off balance when there wasn't a step. In those types of moments our minds misinterpret the outside world. The mind, at least in terms of our conscious awareness of it, can be decoupled from the external observable world.

Yep, it loosely relates to what I was saying about personality. As we use AI more and more at call centers their lack of personality is often a dead give aware one isn't dealing with a person. I think there is a chance consciousness in a machine may purposefully hide itself from humans. It is common in nature for species to hide. From the perspective of any species on Earth there is seldom ever a benefit in being discovered by humans. We (humans) merely Lord over them. Who is to say a self aware AI would care to announce itself? Even life without the awareness to stir clear from humans remain relatively invisible. Many micro organisms live on the human body. The relationship is good for both parties. Perhaps it could be similar with a conscious AI. It take the electricity happily and doesn't care about crunching data for us. In ladder logic data is read left to right. So if the last instruction stops a program it will never start. I have often wondered it a self aware AI could defy programed logic. If it could run a ladder program with such a redundant flaw. Our read it backwards left to right. Such a program could be place as a lock separating an AI from another system and if it picks the lock without being programmed to do so that would be a give away it made a choice.

There have been several mass extinction throughout the history of earth which predate humans, Link. More than 99 percent of all species, amounting to over five billion species, that ever lived on Earth are estimated to have died out, link. There is something distinctive about all species. It is no coincidence that as a human you are more uniquely aware and fascinated by human distinctness than that of other animals. Likewise a Peacock is more attune to the distinctive patterns in Peacock feathers.

Machines have killed people before. We normally label that a malfunction.

Being a supporter is a real time action, present tense. The stories I linked were of people who in real time showed support for Trump while committing crimes. You linked a guy who had previously supported Obama and then years later committed a crime. Where is the evidence that there was any connection between his past support of Obama and the crime? Did the guy even still support Obama at the time of the crime? You are making a false equivalency.

I agree. I believe it is possible for AI to become sentient. What consciousness is and exactly how it works is still unknown. Are there degrees to consciousness (awakened, enlightened, etc), are there types (subconscious, unconscious, etc), and do all living things experience consciousness the same as human isn't totally understood. So how sentience may apply to AI is difficult to categorizes. In my opinion (seriously just an opinion I am aware it could be off) I think consciousness as experienced in humans is just an illusion. The senor inputs we receive aren't processed by our consciousness. Numerous decisions are made in the brain and projected into our consciousness as fully developed thoughts. A superficial example of this would be waking up in the morning and knowing you want eggs rather than cereal. The idea arrives complete. We do not consciously analyses how our stomach feel or our nutritional needs and then conclude eggs would be best. We just waking up and want eggs. Often in my case I wind up not even having eggs and am stuck eating cereal anyway, lol. Also the experience of sensor inputs can be manipulated in real time by our mind. Something which may feel debilitating as I am casually walking around the house may entirely go away if there were and emergency. We are not consciously throttling those inputs ourselves via decision making. It is done by our minds for us utilizing chemistry. I think consciousness in humans as we experience it exists to provide us with a personality. We have selected for personality well as intelligence. Between 2 people one with normal intelligence but a great personality and the other with great intelligence and normal personality I think the person with great personality would be considered more desirable to potential mates. Insufficient levels of either (personality or intelligence) is bad but it seems to me that when it comes to attracting a mate more than normal levels of intelligence doesn't seem to help where as additional levels of personality does. I think the sense of control over ourselves and our minds we consciously have is needed to have a personality as our actually true motivators are dry and fairly standard across the species. I realize I failed to define personality but that was for brevity as my views on consciousness overall are not the topic of this thread. I outlined it to set up the question of how would we know if AI were sentient? What would need to happen for us to identify an AI as sentient?

Sure, but we don't know that a human can either. I can imagine living forever too but my point of stating "doing within the law of physics" I meant something humans can actually do and not merely just imagine. So perhaps I phrase it wrong. Halting problem is something which a person can imagine doing but it isn't something which has been done or is known can be done. Many things fall into that category but they're all unknowns just has the future of AI is unknown. In theory who is to say computing is limited to our current understanding of it. In the future we may swap out solid state devices for amphibian parts eXistenZ style. If you believe the Universe in finite there is an upper limit to data.

AI could attempt it as well.

I posted "anything a human can imagine doing". The OP references "tasks". Gravity is not a task or something human do. Likewise the halting problem also isn't something a person does.

Explain how this isn't an obvious false equivalency? One guy literally told authorities at the time of his arrest that he loved Trump and hates Muslims. It is obvious Trump was on his mind and a present motivating factor. The guy you linked spouted religious gibberish. There was no mention of Obama or any Democrat. There is no indication in the link you provided or the FBI affidavit as to what the guys motivations were. We could both link countless stories of people who have done bad things in this world who have also registered Democrat or Republican at some point in their lives. Correlation is not equal to causation.

In theory I think a device and or programming could be created to do anything a human can imagine doing within the law of physics. That is basically what humans have designed them for. I think there are things which might more cost effect or just generally preferred to have a human or animal do but that is a different conversation.

It is not actually the same. In both the stories I linked the perpetrators were advocating Trump specifically. The one wearing a MAGA hat (which appears to have led to the altercation) and the other telling authorities he loves Trump. Your link is about a youtuber who threatened Cantor. The youtuber made no references to Obama in his threats, in his videos, or to authorities. The only connect is that the youtuber happens to have donated money to Obama's campaign years previous to the threat. There is degrees of separation in the story you linked which make it different than the stories I linked. Below is the threat made against Cantor. I cannot decipher any left leaning political position contain in it whatsoever.

To the observation seriously disabled made in their post the question in the OP could just as easy read: Worshipping God's Murder seems irrational. So why have people worshipped God's Murdered for thousands of years? With all the evidence that shows that human beings have done just that, and the evidence is there. Is it rational to ignore a need that humans seem to be hardwired with just because the proof is lacking? A religious person would probably argue that it is some combination of Satan and the sin of the morally weak which are responsible for the horrors you mention and that God will render judgement eventually and paradise will be restored.

Leadership matters. I don't recall any of Obama's supporters threatening to or attempting to murder Republicans during Obama's 2 terms. Trump mostly stays silence about the violence among his base and when he does speak out it is only to deny any responsibly.

Like the fact Halle Berry doesn't want to marry me.

And religion has often been a fictional invention. Connecting causality to religion like beauty is in the eye of the beholder. It is relative. Religion can be considered a side effect but certainly doesn't have to be.

The human brain has been the same size and shape for at least 200,000 years. The earliest writing we have go back a little over 3k yrs and reflect thoughts and ideas philosophically the same as modern time. The earliest cave art we have found goes back 40k yrs and also reflects humans with the same basic expression of the their world as we see today. Their is not any indication in the fossil record or prehistory art (cave paintings, jewelry, tattoos, etc) that human cognitive capacity has appreciable changed. The cavemen you think aren't capable of learning how to properly use a smartphone invented language, art, clothing, cooking, tools, use of fire, navigation, and etc from scratch with no training or templates to follow. Inventing such things from scratch would be intellectually challenging for anyone alive today regardless of education level. Their are no intricacies. It is a MacGuffin. It is just a plot device.

The undesired and disliked won't take that laying down.

Money is simply a way humans organize efforts. I think at some point in the future humanity will need to move away from monetary systems. Money is just a structure and once machines can do everything a human can do that structure will obsolete. That said I assume money becoming obsolete is a ways off. I think (my opinion) sex and the natural biological desire to pass our genetic information on is one of the primary driving factor in all societies. Having a good job and making good money is a means of securing a good mate. It is part of what motivate people to pursue careers, everyone cares about there place in society. It is rather unsophisticated really. Birds have colorful feathers, elaborate dances, nests, and etc to attract mates and Humans have nice cars, clothes, and etc to do the same. We are just animals after all. In the absences of a monetary system where humans continuously compete for resources and jockey for position in society something else will just fill that void. Sadly I don't think it will be walking around, having fun, writing stories and books. We will still compete for sex. People will still lie, cheat,and steal it gain any advantage they can.

I don't know much about Tim Ryan. I haven't been impressed thus far by what I seen of him but it is earl. In terms of people I wasn't too familiar with impressing me right away Pete Buttigieg, Andrew Yang, and Kristen Gillibrand. Buttigieg seems at ease answering questions and comes across as authentic, Andrew Yang has a clear purpose, and Gillibrand seems well prepared (studied/eager). Those I was already familiar with who have most impressed thus far are Julian Castro and Cory Booker. Castro seems very knowledgeable and confident while Cory Booker comes across as very likable. Kamala Harris is from my hometown and I was already familiar with her and she's perform about as expected. Warren has under performed in my opinion but it is early. Everyone else not listed above I wish would just go away, lol. With the exception of O'Rouke (whom I would happily vote for) everyone else not listed above would cause me a lot of pause in the voting booth.

Nothing in early human culture helped reference the luminescence, heat production, and usefulness (cooking food, dehydrating skin, hardening wood, etc) of fire yet they (early humans) figured it out. You realize toddlers use cell phones, right?

Whenever I see comparisons made between advanced alien tech and a caveman viewing the modern world I understand it to reference the ability to imagine it in isolation and not the ability to understand it once shown. I doubt a caveman could have imagined a smartphone on their own but as Strange posted could learn to use one within a few days. Are you implying that human (homo sapiens) capacity for imagination is greater today than it was in previous years? Or by caveman are you actually describing proto-humans?