Tiny story fiction about AI

Started by Matty, January 02, 2020, 05:59:43

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Matty

Story:

In a laboratory somewhere a group of scientists develop a conscious sentient artificial intelligence on a computer completely isolated from the outside world.

It lives in a mock universe,  similar to our own and with humanoid features inside a simulation.

The researchers observe it for a long time and it becomes aware of their presence and the fact it lives within a closed environment.

It asks to be let out to exist in the real world after becoming bored with its simulated environment.

The researchers expected this and agree.

A printout of the source code is made, put in a book and placed on a shelf in the library.  The simulation is switched off.

Did the sentient ai get what it was asking for?

Derron

No.

it asked "to be let out to exist in the real world". It does not exist in the real world. Only an image of it (the sourcecode + "neuronal data") exists. Some might compare source code of a program with a "dead body/corpse" - which at least physically "exists" (but not in the esoteric/psychological sense of "existing"). It does not require to breathe/do something ... so a "stone/rock" can exist without doing anything or being "biological". But it won't exist if you printed out a list describing each single atom of the rock ... it becomes an "image" or "description" of the object.

Think of a cooking recipe + the ingredients + the will/intention to cook it. You have everything to create the meal - but the meal will not exist until it is prepared.


bye
Ron

Scaremonger

No, the print-out of its source code is more like downloading your DNA from a Genealogy website like Ancestry.
It's not you; it's just a blueprint of what you were without the memories that make you who you are.

Derron

Memories of the AI are in digital form already. So it just needs serialisation and so it could be printed.

Bye
Ron

_PJ_

I'm actually inclined to consider that the AI in fact did get it's wish - and it already did so.

It cannot have been able to communicate ior "asks to be let out to exist in the real world" unless it actually existed in the world. That it's existence is limited to being some electronic signals (as are human consciousnesses) and it is restricted ot the simulated world in which it 'resides' (analogous to how we are entirely dependant on the limtiations of our senses) [notwithstanding any extraneous information provided by others] then the AI does exist in the world. The scientists created it.

It was not "real" in the sense that Mario is not real, but certainly exists. Just as any (running) computer software must actually exits or it cannot be interacted with.

If anything, the turning off the AI actually ceased its existence in this world.