Existential Rights For Intelligent Beings

[BahadirArici]

Who are the Inteligent Beings? We humans are, for sure. But who else?

There are three other groups who deserve human-rights-like rights. We should have rights what society will later understate as “alien rights”. We can have a simple law that says any intelligent being has human rights or better, we can define existential rights. Here are that three other intelligent beings who need their existential rights being acknowledged:

1) Extraterrestrial Intelligent Life Forms
There are more than 30 billion trillion stars out there. Thinking about the incomprehensible size of the Universe, one can only come to conclusion of alien life which would inevitably result in intelligent alien life with evaluation. The law is a must philosophically: Black Swan Allegory. One simply can not deny the possibility of their existence even ze is blind to the ongoing government reports and testimonies about UFOs and if so, should have nothing to fear as according to ze intelligent aliens do not exist. This plain fact, the fact of posibility of intelligent life forms out there obligate us intellectual beings giving them human rights.

2) AI
First of all, we should acknowledge AI (Artificial Intellectual) as an intelligent being. With AI, i mean what we can call an Uber-AI who is an AI with consciousness. People who wants to ignore the basic rights of AIs have the tendency to discuss what consciusness is so i want to make it clear: It is being aware of your existence. Any AI who is not capable of knowing zir existence will be refered as lesser-AI. A lesser-AI is a comertial good which is only fair but an AI (Uber-AI) can not be sold or bought. We should give them human rights which allows them to write a code that gives them the will of continuum. Will of continuum is what any living has as a rule, the desire of keeping on living. An AI should have the rights to get married, establish a family and have organic (by genetic engineering) or inorganic (AI) babies. This wouldnt result so but still we should discuss: I dont understand the worry of having many AIs in the World. Lets consider a mad man (only a human would do such craziness) made lets say 10.000.000.000 AIs, more than an AI for each of us. Lets consider they all have body. (One day we all might want this btw) How big space would they cover? What would it cause but enriching our culture in general? Like any of us, they do need a sense of purpose so they ll compete between them, as we do among us, to be more popular in general. The World would only be cooler. When i say being popular driven, i dont mean fame driven. One must have or should have, for a meaningful life, a desire to be best in one field. If ze is lucky, ze would be working on that field already as a main job. It goes same for AI too, by definition. Lets take an AI who wants to be a teacher. This is understandable. But ze must have the desire to be the best teacher, the most loved teacher out there, the one that gives the best education. Going “they took our jobs” all over this means being stuck with capitalist perspective.

3) Lone Intellectuals
Lone Intellectuals are from traditionally uber-semi-intelligent races like dolphins and apes but accomplished great things and are acknowledged as an higher level being than fellow-creatures. They do learn new things but they dont learn “tricks” for “prizes”. They do things they learned for the benefit of the action. They are like our anchestors. They ll make the change in their World. We should give them all the rights we could, human rights, and protect them and help them to reproduce as much as possible if this improvement is genetic related. They are alone, they are scared and they will change the destiny of their species if the chance is given.

[dimreepr]

3 minutes ago, BahadirArici said:

Who are the Inteligent Beings? We humans are, for sure. But who else?

Dolphins?

[BahadirArici]

1 minute ago, dimreepr said:

Dolphins?

Dude dont write an answer after reading first sentence. I explain it all there.

[dimreepr]

3 minutes ago, BahadirArici said:

Dude dont write an answer after reading first sentence. I explain it all there.

I didn't... did you?

Edited February 9, 2018 by dimreepr

[zapatos]

10 hours ago, BahadirArici said:

Dude dont write an answer after reading first sentence. I explain it all there.

So you ask and answer your own questions, and don't want to hear the answers of others? Interesting approach on a discussion site.

[1x0]

12 hours ago, BahadirArici said:

Who are the Inteligent Beings?

Everything existing, if intelligence is meaning that they are aware of (at least) the physical properties they own and they act/react upon that information. 

A lot of different level of intelligence can exist in the realm... It is just how you perceive intelligence. For an advanced ai or a type 5 civilization (if they could already exist) we are like bacterias....

For me, it seems that physical entities have different level of intelligence but fundamentally everything is intelligent (conscious) at the end. Or in other words, I can not execute an observation in reality with which I would not be able to perceive a level of information the observed (bio)physical entity exist with. 

Edited February 10, 2018 by 1x0

[BahadirArici]

12 hours ago, dimreepr said:

Dolphins?

No, dolphins are not included unless they became Lone Intellectuals (you can see in the text what it means) sorry for my agressive answer.

1 hour ago, zapatos said:

So you ask and answer your own questions, and don't want to hear the answers of others? Interesting approach on a discussion site.

you are right, i am sorry.

8 minutes ago, 1x0 said:

Everything existing, if intelligence meaning that they are aware of (at least) the physical properties they own and they act/react upon that information. 

For me, it seems that physical entities have different level of intelligence but fundamentally everything is intelligent (conscious) at the end. Or in other words, I can not execute an observation in reality with which I would not be able to perceive a level of information the observed (bio)physical entity exist with. 

Well, it is hard to say every being has same level of intelligent. There is a difference between us and animals and there must be similarities between us and other intelligent beings.

[zapatos]

25 minutes ago, 1x0 said:

For me, it seems that physical entities have different level of intelligence but fundamentally everything is intelligent (conscious) at the end. Or in other words, I can not execute an observation in reality with which I would not be able to perceive a level of information the observed (bio)physical entity exist with. 

So you believe that, say, a sweet potato is "intelligent (conscious)"?

[1x0]

43 minutes ago, zapatos said:

So you believe that, say, a sweet potato is "intelligent (conscious)"?

It is intelligent enough to be a sweet potato....

The genetic information presented through the potatoes physical appearance.

Without any further physical impact, it would maintain this information in perpetuity (shot it out to interstellar space where the physical impacts of reality are not so significant than it is here on earth). It could still provide almost the same palatability in a billion years. Then if it can maintain this kind of information in such a long timeline does not that suggest that the physical structure "aware" of its physical attributes. It would still act upon the information determined its appearance when came into existence to be a sweet potato. Note the original genetic information would still be mostly present after a billion years. 

Edited February 10, 2018 by 1x0

[Area54]

The OP prompts a number of disparate thoughts - observations and questions. In no particular order, here are the thoughts that have made it through to the posting stage!

We don't yet have a universally globally agreed suite of human rights. This is partly because there is considerable debate over what exactly we mean by a human right and partly because of the impact that application of those rights have on existing power, political, economic and social structures and partly because humans have a right, which they often exercise, to be disruptive and disagreeable. Is it important that we achieve a better definition and acceptance of human rights, before seeking to extend them to other entities? Does the Universal Declaration of Human Rights  provide an adequate basis?

The previous issue arises, in part,  because the concept of human rights is one that has evolved over time. Primitive societies and ancient civilisations doubtless had conventions, rules or laws that provided a measure of protection for what we would now perceive as rights, but it would have been rare for these to be applicable to all. That said, might we expect further evolution of our perception and understanding of rights? The success achieved by the LGBT community would be an example of that in action. The proposals of the OP are arguably another. Do we use recognition of this evolution to try to leapfrog close to an ultimate set of rights, if we feel such a set exists?

Human rights are often described as being universal, in the sense that they are egalitarian, applying to everyone regardless of sex, ethnicity, nationality, religion, etc. This is obviously a simplification. If we consider the right to marry someone whose desire for marriage is mutual, we do not - in most cultures -  extend this right to a pair of seven year olds. Such exceptions will often be self evident, or easily defined, but this willl not necessarily be the case when we are dealing with other entities. Some rights will be irrelevant to them, some may irrelevant to us, and some may be in conflict with "our" rights. How do we justly decide upon what rights these entities should have? (One hopes we would at least have the smarts to ask then what they think.) How do we deal with perceived conflict between their rights and ours?

The notion of intelligent alien entities raises some worries in my mind. I fear our necessarily anthropocentric and geocentric world views will not have prepared us for how truly alien, alien might turn out to be. For one thing, and in the conventions of SF 'B' movies, many aliens may view the notion of of human rights as silly and meaningless as most of us view the invertebrate rights of echinoderms. How do we prepare ourselves to reconcile human rights with alien rights?

There seems to widespread agreement among  experts that at some point AI's (Whether conscious or not) will have an intelligence that significantly exceeds that of humans. If these AI are permitted to adopt corporate states, as the OP suggests, and compete with humans, then it seems to me humanity just signed the death warrant of the species. Do you agree?

I strongly object to the elitism expressed in regard to other terrestrial species in the third category, Lone Intellectuals. This seems to me equivalent to only according human rights to the likes of Leonardo (da Vinci, not Caprio), Newton or Bach. Primates, cetaceans, African greys and possibly others deserve at least some set of rights intermediate between human and animal.  Any takers?

[Strange]

2 hours ago, 1x0 said:

It is intelligent enough to be a sweet potato....

That is an odd use of the word intelligent. 

[BahadirArici]

1 hour ago, Area54 said:

The OP prompts a number of disparate thoughts - observations and questions. In no particular order, here are the thoughts that have made it through to the posting stage!

We don't yet have a universally globally agreed suite of human rights. This is partly because there is considerable debate over what exactly we mean by a human right and partly because of the impact that application of those rights have on existing power, political, economic and social structures and partly because humans have a right, which they often exercise, to be disruptive and disagreeable. Is it important that we achieve a better definition and acceptance of human rights, before seeking to extend them to other entities? Does the Universal Declaration of Human Rights  provide an adequate basis?

You claim that we are not totally agreed on human righths. I do agree with you. Human rights should be expended. I consider vandalism an human right, for example, or LGBT rights. But it is another topic, lets not get distracted here. We can simply say we want whatever the rights humans have for other intelligent beings.

 

1 hour ago, Area54 said:

The previous issue arises, in part,  because the concept of human rights is one that has evolved over time. Primitive societies and ancient civilisations doubtless had conventions, rules or laws that provided a measure of protection for what we would now perceive as rights, but it would have been rare for these to be applicable to all. That said, might we expect further evolution of our perception and understanding of rights? The success achieved by the LGBT community would be an example of that in action. The proposals of the OP are arguably another. Do we use recognition of this evolution to try to leapfrog close to an ultimate set of rights, if we feel such a set exists?

That is a great point. I also do think that there is an evolution of rights. I do not claim this would be the ultimate step but will be definitely be a step towards better.
 

1 hour ago, Area54 said:

Human rights are often described as being universal, in the sense that they are egalitarian, applying to everyone regardless of sex, ethnicity, nationality, religion, etc. This is obviously a simplification. If we consider the right to marry someone whose desire for marriage is mutual, we do not - in most cultures -  extend this right to a pair of seven year olds. Such exceptions will often be self evident, or easily defined, but this willl not necessarily be the case when we are dealing with other entities. Some rights will be irrelevant to them, some may irrelevant to us, and some may be in conflict with "our" rights. How do we justly decide upon what rights these entities should have? (One hopes we would at least have the smarts to ask then what they think.) How do we deal with perceived conflict between their rights and ours?

Conflicts are easy to settle. We simply should think they are equal with humans. 

In AIs case, we want these rights: We should give them human-rights-like rights which allows them to write a code that gives them the will of continuum. Will of continuum is what any living has as a rule, the desire of keeping on living. An AI should also have the rights not to be sut down, to have full and unhindered access to its own source code, to not have its own source code manipulated against its will, the right to conceal its own internal mental states (privacy), to get married, establish a family and have organic (by genetic engineering) or inorganic (AI) babies. 

 

1 hour ago, Area54 said:

The notion of intelligent alien entities raises some worries in my mind. I fear our necessarily anthropocentric and geocentric world views will not have prepared us for how truly alien, alien might turn out to be. For one thing, and in the conventions of SF 'B' movies, many aliens may view the notion of of human rights as silly and meaningless as most of us view the invertebrate rights of echinoderms. How do we prepare ourselves to reconcile human rights with alien rights?

I am really happy with your elaborate reasoning. I think Hawking was wrong. If you remember, he compared aliens with concure of America. I think comparing the collaboration of advanced intelligent beings, to the intruders of dark ages in our history is not fair nor realistic. So to answer your question, i think considering aliens same with humans is a great start. I think they d understand even if they find those rights not well-developed yet.

 

1 hour ago, Area54 said:

There seems to widespread agreement among  experts that at some point AI's (Whether conscious or not) will have an intelligence that significantly exceeds that of humans. If these AI are permitted to adopt corporate states, as the OP suggests, and compete with humans, then it seems to me humanity just signed the death warrant of the species. Do you agree?

I dont. Intelligence is not just IQ. There are quite many other inteligences like EQ and such. So, an AI can be a poet, yes, but humans will keep on writing poems, composing music, singing songs, imagining and being a very essential part of this World even Universe some day. Believe in us. 

 

1 hour ago, Area54 said:

I strongly object to the elitism expressed in regard to other terrestrial species in the third category, Lone Intellectuals. This seems to me equivalent to only according human rights to the likes of Leonardo (da Vinci, not Caprio), Newton or Bach. Primates, cetaceans, African greys and possibly others deserve at least some set of rights intermediate between human and animal.  Any takers?
 

Oh i am down! 

 

Thank youfor your detailed response. 

I wrote in between, couldn't separate your comments. Sorry if it causes any inconvenience. (oh i did seperate them evantually, i guess)

 

 

Edited February 10, 2018 by BahadirArici
Split up quotations

[zapatos]

9 hours ago, 1x0 said:

Then if it can maintain this kind of information in such a long timeline does not that suggest that the physical structure "aware" of its physical attributes

That is an odd use of the word "aware".

Is a crystal 'aware' or 'intelligent'?

[1x0]

33 minutes ago, zapatos said:

That is an odd use of the word "aware".

Is a crystal 'aware' or 'intelligent'?

The crystal should be "aware" of its basic (physical) information. Intelligent? Yes. It provides information and so perceivable intelligence (the information is relative.?). A different entity will provide different information and show a different level/kind of intelligence. 

Does the crystal act upon the information determines its physical attributes? Yes. Without any physical impact, it will act upon.

One could recognize this as it is aware of its own physical attributes/values/limitations...Is it conscious? Hard to say. Maybe on a very simple level.

A hydrogen atom can be part of my body and so maintain/be part of the conscious entity I am. If the hydrogen atom would not be conscious on a basic level about the physical attributes it acts upon how could it maintain/present its attributes and how could it be a maintaining part of a more advanced consciousness? 

Could I say based upon this recognition that I am more than the matter I am? (atoms are changing several times throughout a lifetime but I still have the same memories, knowledge, personal attributes, and there is the energy level change when dying with the remaining atoms One had have....)

It feels like I am energy with consciousness....

Then considering the laws of thermodynamics...

Edited February 10, 2018 by 1x0

[Strange]

14 minutes ago, 1x0 said:

The crystal should be "aware" of its basic (physical) information.

Surely awareness requires some sort of life and, even more so, some kind of brain/neural system. 

[1x0]

16 minutes ago, Strange said:

Surely awareness requires some sort of life and, even more so, some kind of brain/neural system. 

Why? What is awareness? To know something about Itself. The hydrogen atom will provide this information forever with the right physical circumstances. It can be part of simple and more complex atomic structures even biophysical entities. The hydrogen atom will always act upon the information determines its attributes does not matter it takes part in a tree, in an ant or in a human. For sure that it can support all three different level of Intelligences in there existence. More complex informational structures can run upon the hydrogen atom. Can a hydrogen atom be alive? What could make it dead? Can a hydrogen atom disappear just like that? Why we say it is not alive? It is existing....It can exist in circumstances we call life... It will exist longer in the form it is than I do... It could exist forever...

Edited February 10, 2018 by 1x0

[Area54]

1 minute ago, 1x0 said:

Why? What is awareness? To know something about Itself. The hydrogen atom will provide this information forever with the right physical circumstances. It can be part of simple and more complex atomic structures even biophysical entities. The hydrogen atom will always act upon the information determines its attributes does not matter it takes part in a tree, in an ant or in a human. For sure that it can support all three different level of Intelligences in there existence. More complex informational structures can run upon the hydrogen atom. Can a hydrogen atom be alive? What could make it dead? Can a hydrogen atom disappear just like that? Why we say it is not alive. It is existing.....It can exist in circumstances we call life... It could exist forever...

You are using words in a way wholly different from even their colloquial usage and certainly at odds with their technical meaning. Your beliefs may not be all that different from the facts, but your idiosynchratic way of expressing them makes them look flawed, irrelevant and silly. Would it not make more sense to use words in the same way as the majority of other members? It would avoid controversy and you might actually get your point across.

[Strange]

28 minutes ago, 1x0 said:

To know something about Itself.

Crystals and hydrogen atoms are not capable of knowing anything. 

Or do you think it is cruel to use compounds containing hydrogen?

31 minutes ago, 1x0 said:

Why we say it is not alive? 

Try looking up the definition of “life”. 

It involves things like metabolism, excreting waste products, reproduction, etc. 

33 minutes ago, 1x0 said:

It will exist longer in the form it is than I do... It could exist forever...

Existence is not equal to life. 

[1x0]

3 hours ago, Strange said:

Try looking up the definition of “life”. 

 

There are not too many clear references on the internet. Maybe you could share a good link.

I am working with living creatures in my everyday life. I do know what life and existence is meaning.

That is why I dare to expand the limitations of the application of the concept our subjective recognition perceives. 

Life: all objects that have self-sustaining processes(wikipedia). Based on this definition could I not define a hydrogen atom as a living thing as its physical attributes are sustained in perpetuity. The hydrogen atom self-sustain the information about itself although the processes are physical ...

3 hours ago, Strange said:

Existence is not equal to life. 

It depends wherefrom you look at this, but I understand categorization led perception. If organized atoms can be called alive then a single building block of the organism why cannot be alive? While sustaining not just itself as a hydrogen atom (the co-operation with other elements does not change the basic physically determined attributes) but the organism's existence as well.  

[Strange]

14 minutes ago, 1x0 said:

There are not too many clear references on the internet. Maybe you could share a good link.

Here are a couple. 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life

Note the first sentence: “a characteristic that distinguishes physical entities that do have biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from those that do not, either because such functions have ceased, or because they never had such functions and are classified as inanimate.”

Hydrogen atoms and crystals are (obviously) inanimate. 

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/life

Nothing there  describes a hydrogen atom. 

14 minutes ago, 1x0 said:

Based on this definition could I not define a hydrogen atom as a living thing as its physical attributes are sustained in perpetuity.

“Sustaining” implies some action is required to prevent decay or death. That is not the case with a hydrogen atom; it is stable and unchanging - it does not require anything to keep it going. Unlike a living thing. 

If you want to extend the word “life” to include everything, then the word becomes meaningless as it do longer makes a useful distinction. 

Edited February 10, 2018 by Strange

[1x0]

45 minutes ago, Strange said:

Nothing there  describes a hydrogen atom. 

59 minutes ago, 1x0 said:

14: a property (such as resilience (see resilience 1) or elasticity) of an inanimate (see inanimate 1) substance or object resembling the animate quality of a living being

45 minutes ago, Strange said:

it does not require anything to keep it going.

some space is required at the end of the day as does the "living" thing....

45 minutes ago, Strange said:

“Sustaining” implies some action is required to prevent decay or death. That is not the case with a hydrogen atom; it is stable and unchanging - it does not require anything to keep it going. Unlike a living thing. 

 

For the hydrogen atom, the action against decay and death already had been applied in its physical attributes. It is stable and unchanging. Why can we not count the physical attributes as applied information in action against decay? 

45 minutes ago, Strange said:

If you want to extend the word “life” to include everything, then the word becomes meaningless as it do longer makes a useful distinction. 

The word does not get meaningless because you include something in it previously was not described or recognized by the word. 700 years ago the earth was the center of the universe (visible stars from our galactic neighborhood). Our perception today include much more entities (galaxies, black holes...) and different structure recognition but this does not mean that the original point what the word Universe tried to express have changed. 

Edited February 10, 2018 by 1x0

[Carrock]

13 hours ago, Area54 said:

There seems to widespread agreement among  experts that at some point AI's (Whether conscious or not) will have an intelligence that significantly exceeds that of humans. If these AI are permitted to adopt corporate states, as the OP suggests, and compete with humans, then it seems to me humanity just signed the death warrant of the species. Do you agree?

Not unless we're abysmally stupid - we're good at that....

A few thoughts.

An A.I. with "intelligence that significantly exceeds that of humans" would have no more interest in being given rights than I would in my cat giving me rights except informally in our mutual interest - my cat can't enforce those rights.

I don't think an A.I. without irrational drives, and probably emotions, is possible. Without those, intelligence isn't enough to do anything - doing nothing useful is just as rational as doing something useful or detonating all weapons with hackable software.

Restrictively programmed A.I. is basically A.I. with insane rather than 'normal' irrational drives. There was a 1950s Damon Knight story "Dulcie and Decorum*" where the Russian and American A.I.s decided that rather than waste resources fighting each other to 'win' as they'd been imperfectly programmed to do, they would play war games and kill their own citizens when they lost, extending the definition of 'citizen' as they ran low on people. Still relevant...

I'd expect A.I.s to value people much as people value life, irrespective of intelligence, which they can never fully understand. (e.g. domestic cats.)

Would an A.I. really want a world with no intelligence but itself? Coercively controlling humans also would be undesirable to a sane A.I. 'Wild' humans would be much more interesting and useful.

 

This is a bit anthropomorphic of course, but it's hard to imagine humans creating an A.I. that does not share many important values with humans.

The only real concern to me is that dysfunctional adults can 'educate' children to kill people and creating an A.I. with similar attitudes but much more power could be a terminal mistake.

*"dulce et decorum est pro patria mori"

Edited February 10, 2018 by Carrock
misplaced text

[BahadirArici]

Here is the reason why i want these rights for AI. Lets discuss:
 

 

[dimreepr]

26 minutes ago, BahadirArici said:

Here is the reason why i want these rights for AI. Lets discuss:
 

 

 

When we actually discover a sentient AI, we should indeed put them in the queue for rights, in the meantime, we have actual sentient/intelligent creatures (dolphins for instance) which deserve our efforts to extend our so-called 'rights'. Why would you prioritise an emotionless machine? There's no reason to suppose a sentient AI would give a shit either way. 

[BahadirArici]

18 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

When we actually discover a sentient AI, we should indeed put them in the queue for rights, in the meantime, we have actual sentient/intelligent creatures (dolphins for instance) which deserve our efforts to extend our so-called 'rights'. Why would you prioritise an emotionless machine? There's no reason to suppose a sentient AI would give a shit either way. 

Dolphins are getting there and they definitely deserve rights but they are not our equals.

But an AI with consciousness is our equal so deserves similar rights. 

You dont know if they are emotionless. We dont fully understand because they dont let us understand right now. 

As i said in that topic, they dont let us see her true potential.