Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!actnyc!gcf
From: gcf@actnyc.UUCP (Gordon Fitch)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Re: The future of AI
Message-ID: <958@actnyc.UUCP>
Date: 10 Jun 88 14:50:21 GMT
References: <53.22AB6402@isishq.UUCP> <10431@sol.ARPA>
Reply-To: gcf@actnyc.UUCP (Gordon Fitch)
Organization: InterACT Corporation
Lines: 25

In article <10431@sol.ARPA> ken@cs.rochester.edu (Ken Yap) writes:
} Here is more food for thought:
} 
} If/when an intelligent machine is created, how do you know it won't
} have "human" traits, including being lazy, having emotions, getting
} bored, etc? ....
} I suspect that a machine complex enough to be intelligent will also
} have other traits. The unspoken wish of AI is to have machines do our
} dirty work and not complain. I think if you make a machine that smart,
} it might object to doing dirty work or throw tantrums.

The only reason to build a machine which acts just (or pretty much)
like a human being is to get rid of human beings, or at least the need
for them.  So, though there is motivation on the part of some people to
do this, while there is an ample supply of human beings most researchers
will find themselves trying to build machines which are intelligent
in different ways than human beings.  We have already seen some of this
in the computer field, where "computation" was developed beyond the
ability of even the most efficient idiots-savants.

Possibly, machines will be built to identify, as well as design, other
machines with abilities and goals completely beyond human comprehension.
Further machines will then be needed to explain the former to human
beings, or determine whether they have become psychotic -- an occupational
hazard in these areas.