I always enjoyed teaching the network topologies of LAN's and WAN's. — universeness

Oh, then you know much better than me, sir!
(Anyway, Data Networks & Communications was never my strong point, far from that. Too much H/W involved and I'm a S/W man. Also, too much theory. And I'm a practical man. :smile:)

using a couple of old routers and a stripped down stand alone and networked Op system. — universeness

I get the image.
In your turn, get the following image: Before modems came to wide use, in the office I was working we didn't have any, so I created a program in assembly for transfering data from one PC to another, by connecting their serial ports with a cable! I didn't even know what LAN was.

No, I will not offer a candidate AGI/ASI system that I am not convinced is self-aware. — universeness

:grain: OK, if you want to raise the bar.

The future perfect — universeness

I noted down the link. On;y that I will check it tomorrow because after this, I'll close the store (PC) ...

[Re OpenAI]I am on the list to be connected, the list is full at present. — universeness

Wow, is that so? Well, I know that OpenAI faces a huge overloading problem. Well, most probably the participition was way larger that what tye expected. It can also be for lack of financial resources.

I get the image.
In your turn, get the following image: Before modems came to wide use, in the office I was working we didn't have any, so I created a program in assembly for transfering data from one PC to another, by connecting their serial ports with a cable! I didn't even know what LAN was. — Alkis Piskas

Interesting, what cable did you use for the transfer? If it was a simple twisted wire pair telephone cable then you would have needed to modulate a digital input into an analogue one, to then send it along the cable. The signal would then need demodulation at the receiving port, so you must have converted between digital and analogue at some point, or am I missing something?
Did you send the file as a payload stream with start and stop bits and a parity bit?

Wow, is that so? Well, I know that OpenAI faces a huge overloading problem. — Alkis Piskas

Hah! I just checked again to see if I could set up an account and I was successful! :grin:
They SAID they would send me an email when space was available!! :rage:
Still, I now have an OpenAI account :party: :party:
I will go chat to chatGBT forthwith! Thanks for inspiring me to check the OpenAI status Alkis!

I asked chatGBT to write me a song about 'what's emergent in humans.'
Here's what I got:



Verse 1:
We are more than just the sum of our parts
Our minds and bodies, intertwined works of art
There's something deeper, something that we can't explain
A quality within us, that we can't contain

Chorus:
It's the emergent, the magic in our souls
The mystery that makes us whole
It's the way we laugh, the way we cry
The beauty that we can't deny

Verse 2:
It's the love we share, the bonds we form
The way we weather the wildest storms
It's the courage to stand up and fight
And the power to make things right

Chorus:
It's the emergent, the magic in our souls
The mystery that makes us whole
It's the way we laugh, the way we cry
The beauty that we can't deny

Bridge:
It's in the way we create, and innovate
And the way we communicate
Our ability to dream, and to inspire
To light the world with a single fire

Chorus:
It's the emergent, the magic in our souls
The mystery that makes us whole
It's the way we laugh, the way we cry
The beauty that we can't deny

Outro:
We are more than just flesh and bone
There's something greater, something unknown
It's the emergent, the beauty in our veins
A quality that forever remains.

:lol: I think chatGBT might have theistic tendencies. :rofl:

I'm not so sure, perhaps 'orga' components will be as vital to the successful development of interstellar space, as any pure 'mecha.' — universeness

Meat baggage is extraneous payload which is too resources and energy demanding for any ASI-controlled space mission. Given that relativistic velocities will turn even the interstellar vacuum between the Oort Cloud and Alpha Centuri into an incinerating plasma of particulate-trace gases impacts, an "interstellar space craft" would have to sustain "orga" for millennia traveling at 'safe' sub-relativistic speeds. "Mecha" – TINY von Neumann-like Bracewell probes powered by antimatter or a micro-singularity – seems to me the way to go, especially for post-Singularity transcensionist posthumanity. :nerd:

postscript: Unless, of course, we're talking about interstellar missions (such as asteroid O'Neill cylinder terreria generation ships), again traveling at even lower sub-relativistic velocities, arriving at their destination star systems after many millennia ... like the Star Trek TOS episode "For The World Is Hollow And I Touched The Sky", e8s3. :victory:

I read the article about Hassabis. The stuff with proteins looks quite interesting and promising.
And look what happens sometimes when one gets involved into and talks a lot about a certain subject: it meets this subject in his way without even searching for it. I was just reading the MSN news this morning and one of the subjects was ...

Scientists target ‘biocomputing’ breakthrough with use of human brain cells

https://www.ft.com/content/9f51a30d-eedc-446a-8a5c-d2997c670c65

The universe at it's largest scale, seems to be a system based on disorder-order-disorder. — universeness

Just a tiny notice. The terms "order/disorder" are observer depended. ITs not an intrinsic feature that a system can be "based on". The different phases of entropy might appear to us as a state of disorder but in reality we are not fully aware of a system's all hidden variables.
Now I am not sure that "singularity" is valid idea because according to quantum mechanics singularities are impossible. Changes in state across larger areas of the cosmos is closer to what we identify as "singularity".

Remember I told you that if an AI technology would be created that would involve consciousness, that would be not the AI we know but something totally different? Well ...

AI Could Be Made Obsolete by 'Biocomputers' Running on Human Brain Cells
https://www.cnet.com/science/ai-could-be-made-obsolete-by-oi-biocomputers-running-on-human-brain-cells/
This article refers to what I posted in my previous message.

So, maybe you should think of changing direction ... :smile:

what cable did you use for the transfer? — universeness

From what I can remember --35 years ago!-- I asked a H/W guy to make this cable for me by joining two serial cables.

If it was a simple twisted wire pair telephone cable ... am I missing something? — universeness

It rings a bell. But even if you missed something. I am not at all the right person to tell you! :smile:

Did you send the file as a payload stream with start and stop bits and a parity bit? — universeness

It also rings a bell. But, as I remember I had read only the necessary, basic literature on the subject --a couple of pages, maybe-- just to do the job. The rest --as far as programming was concerned-- was serial port handling. And one can do such things only with machine language. I remember a colleague, working only with a high level language, called me the "Last Mohican", referring to my expertise in assembly language, which was not used anymore in programming circles. Well, I don't know if I would had made all that money from programming if I didn't program in assembly ...

I just checked again to see if I could set up an account and I was successful — universeness

Great. But I expected that, of course.

Thanks for inspiring me to check the OpenAI status — universeness

You are welcome!

To have feelings, there must be a body that can feel. — Athena

Just en passant, the body cannot process feelings (emotions). It can only feel their effects and suffer its consequences. The mind is the "place" where feelings are created --i.e they come from-- and processed.

(I just fell on that because you were referred to in a message I received from @universeness.)

I think chatGBT might have theistic tendencies. — universeness

Ha! :grin:
Well, I don't know about "theistic" but certainly spiritual. Maybe dualistic too. :smile:
Anyway, it's good --for me at least-- to "hear" things like that even if they do not come directly from a human. (They come of course indirectly from and are based on human thinking ...)

TINY von Neumann-like Bracewell probes powered by antimatter or a micro-singularity – seems to me the way to go — 180 Proof

I agree that any initial attempt to get to alpha centauri will not involve any 'orga.'
But I don't think that will still be the case, on a timescale of thousands or tens of thousands of years from now. The best candidate idea for now seems to be starshot.

Unless, of course, we're talking about interstellar missions (such as asteroid O'Neill cylinder terreria generation ships), again traveling at even lower sub-relativistic velocities, arriving at their destination star systems after many millennia ... like the Star Trek TOS episode "For The World Is Hollow And I Touched The Sky", e8s3. — 180 Proof

I do think some kind of generational ships will be used to establish interstellar communities eventually, unless we find some kind of shortcut tech, currently proposed in sci-fi, warp tech or subspace/hyperspace gate style tech, wormhole tech, etc. I don't assign much credence to any of those proposals, but I would of course love to think one of them might prove to be possible in the future.

Another great star trek original series episode:

I thought however, that the base story, that the people did not know they were on a generational spaceship and the controlling mecha system kept that information from them, and posed as their god, was an unlikely scenario that an AGI/ASI, would conclude was the best way to 'maintain' the mindset of the people involved.

The stuff with proteins looks quite interesting and promising. — Alkis Piskas

AlphaFold is considered a major breakthrough for protein folding, from DeepMind AlphaFold, we have:
This can produce a better understanding of proteins and enable scientists to change their function for the good of our bodies — for example in treating diseases caused by misfolded proteins, such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Huntington’s and cystic fibrosis.

Scientists target ‘biocomputing’ breakthrough with use of human brain cells — Alkis Piskas

Biological computers may prove even more interesting than quantum computers, but they really are in their infancy. They have to identify a biological unit that has a 'natural' mechanism to reliably emulate 'at least 'two states.' These states would represent 1 and 0, in the same way as 'no voltage' and 'a voltage >0 and <= 5' represents 0 and 1 respectively in electronic computers, today. Proteins were the best candidate as far as I know. It's interesting that some kind of 'human brain cell,' might prove to be the better candidate. The ability of prions (I think) to cause cell replication would potentially mean a biological computer that can 'grow' as much memory capacity as it needs to. One biological computer could potentially hold all human information currently memorialised on Earth. It could easily store the contents of a human brain. But, at the moment it's mostly conjecture and speculation, but it is based on sound science. I could not make use of the link you offered as it required a subscription to progress to it's content.

Just a tiny notice. The terms "order/disorder" are observer depended. ITs not an intrinsic feature that a system can be "based on". The different phases of entropy might appear to us as a state of disorder but in reality we are not fully aware of a system's all hidden variables.
Now I am not sure that "singularity" is valid idea because according to quantum mechanics singularities are impossible. Changes in state across larger areas of the cosmos is closer to what we identify as "singularity". — Nickolasgaspar

Well, hello again Mr Gaspar! I hope any exchange between us, can be more fruitful than it has been in the past. I agree that order/disorder can be observer dependent based on relativity.
But the cosmological principle states: From Wiki:
In modern physical cosmology, the cosmological principle is the notion that the spatial distribution of matter in the universe is homogeneous and isotropic when viewed on a large enough scale, since the forces are expected to act uniformly throughout the universe, and should, therefore, produce no observable irregularities in the large-scale structuring over the course of evolution of the matter field that was initially laid down by the Big Bang.

The part I have underlined, confirms for me, that after the big bang, we moved from a situation of disorder, everywhere in the universe, and due to the homogeneous nature of the universe at that scale, that disorder, 'evolved' into the 'relative' 'order' of the galaxy clusters we observe today.

I agree that the term 'singularity' is ill-formed as a concept in all it's variations. I tend to simply use the term as a 'placeholder,' for that part of the story that remains currently 'fogged' to us.

Remember I told you that if an AI technology would be created that would involve consciousness, that would be not the AI we know but something totally different? Well ... — Alkis Piskas

Something like that, yes. I would call it an AGI or ASI, if such was created and became conscious.

AI Could Be Made Obsolete by 'Biocomputers' Running on Human Brain Cells
https://www.cnet.com/science/ai-could-be-made-obsolete-by-oi-biocomputers-running-on-human-brain-cells/
This article refers to what I posted in my previous message.
So, maybe you should think of changing direction ... :smile: — Alkis Piskas

It would not be much of a shift in direction. It's all part of the race between 'orga' and 'mecha' for the next stage in transhumanism. From your link, we have:

Concepts like biological computers and organoid intelligence could lead to a library's worth of new ethical discussions. Conversations about organoids becoming sentient, conscious or self-aware and the ensuing implications have been underway for years now, even though the technology is thought to be immature at the moment.
Organoid intelligence could 'augment' the current abilities of the human mind and body.
Advances in 'artificial' 'mecha' technologies could do the same.
Both systems seem capable of developing independent self-awareness and ALSO an ability to merge and become ONE with current humans on a person by person basis.

Organoid intelligence and biocomputers won't pose a threat to AI or human brains grown the old-fashioned way anytime soon. But Hartung believes it's time to begin increasing production of brain organoids and training them with AI in order to breakthrough some of the shortcomings of our existing silicon systems.
Orga and Mecha advances may become combative in the distant future, one may 'defeat' or stop the progress of the other, humans may be 'piggy in the middle' between them. Orga and Mecha systems may combine and both help to enhance humans and vastly increase the options we have, our longevity, our robustness etc. It all sounds pretty exciting to me, much more so than any imaginings from the theistic or theosophist camps.

From what I can remember --35 years ago!-- I asked a H/W guy to make this cable for me by joining two serial cables. — Alkis Piskas

It rings a bell. But even if you missed something. I am not at all the right person to tell you — Alkis Piskas

My knowledge falters somewhat, when it comes to the physics level of electricity, and signals flying through the air and rushing down cables and analogue and digital forms.
Digital, down a cable, for me, is 'pulses' of >0 and <= 5 volts, synchronised, according to the 'clock pulse' of sending and receiving computers.
Digital to analogue conversion (modem's) were needed, due to the sending of data down the already existing telephone network, which were (POTS)(Plain old Telephone Service) based, and were completely analogue.
Modems were only needed for computers communicating over the traditional POTS.
Two computers communicating in the same office or within rooms or within a building, did not normally require any digital to analogue conversions (I think). Things like 'repeaters' etc were needed but no ADC's or DAC. Analogue to digital or digital to analogue converters.

Did you send the file as a payload stream with start and stop bits and a parity bit?
— universeness
It also rings a bell. But, as I remember I had read only the necessary, basic literature on the subject --a couple of pages, maybe-- just to do the job. The rest --as far as programming was concerned-- was serial port handling. And one can do such things only with machine language. I remember a colleague, working only with a high level language, called me the "Last Mohican", referring to my expertise in assembly language, which was not used anymore in programming circles. Well, I don't know if I would had made all that money from programming if I didn't program in assembly ... — Alkis Piskas

All sounds like good fun to me anyway! I loved assembly code, with all its opcodes and operands and how it accessed and manipulated internal registers, as well as the data bus, the address bus and the control lines. I even had the 'accumulator' as my 'favourite register,' :lol: I know how geeky that sounds, but I type it with a happy smile on my face. :grin:
It could have been worse, you could have been a binary programmer in the days of punch cards or input tape, big glass valves, which switched on and off, to represent binary code etc. Must have been fun trying to find a code error in a million lines of binary code, printed out on an early daisy wheel or dot matrix printer. :scream:

I agree that any initial attempt to get to alpha centauri will not involve any 'orga.'
But I don't think that will still be the case, on a timescale of thousands or tens of thousands of years from now. — universeness

Assuming the post-Singularity transcension (i.e. we may follow other ETI in this "solution to the Fermi Paradox"), I think there will not be any "orga" or biomorphic h. sapiens "thousands or tens of thousands of years from now" or any need by us for space travel long long before then. No "Star Trek" or "Stargate" fantasies, my friend. :smirk:

Biological computers may prove even more interesting than quantum computers — universeness

Indeed. I agree. Let's see what awaits us ...

Proteins were the best candidate as far as I know. — universeness

I had no idea about all this. Watching today's news paid off ... in an unexpected way!

One biological computer could potentially hold all human information currently memorialised on Earth. It could easily store the contents of a human brain. — universeness

I see that you can process all this quite admirably. But I'm not surprised at all. :wink:

But, at the moment it's mostly conjecture and speculation — universeness

But you like that, don't you? :razz:

I would call it an AGI or ASI — universeness

AGI and ASI are still AI, only much more develloped. In fact AGI is also called "strong AI", and it comes from AI research. ASI is also based on AI and is considered "strong AI".
But what I am talking about --biocomputers-- is something totally different. It has totally different foundations. Still, as you say, all that are at their infance and mostly speculations ...

Concepts like biological computers and organoid intelligence could lead to a library's worth of new ethical discussions. — universeness

That's another story. It reminds of the ethical issues with Dolly the sheep ...

Organoid intelligence and biocomputers won't pose a threat to AI — universeness

You shouldn't take to heart what I said about your changing direction ... :smile:
Besides, I'm with you. I'm a AI fan and I don't want it to die! :grin:

No "Star Trek" or "Stargate" fantasies, my friend. — 180 Proof

I'm not as convinced as you seem to be of that one.
What do you think about the currently slow progress, but definite progress nonetheless, in 'biological' computing? A future ASI may be organically based. Perhaps the 'organic' element will prove to be essential to becoming self-aware. I fully accept that I have zero evidence of this, other than that we have no current example of a self-aware mecha, but we do have plenty of examples of self-aware orga.
Do you assign 0 credence to a future ASI, which is organic and if so, why?

My knowledge falters somewhat, when it comes to the physics level of electricity, and signals flying through the air and rushing down cables and analogue and digital forms. — universeness

If yours (knowledge about electricity) falters, mine can barely walk! :grin:

Digital to analogue conversion (modem's) were needed, due to the sending of data down the already existing telephone network ... — universeness

Bad old times ... Struggling with 16 bps ...
(The Sound of dial-up Internet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsNaR6FRuO0)

All sounds like good fun to me anyway! — universeness

Same here.

I loved assembly code — universeness

I cant say I loved assembly per se. I rather loved what you could do with it!

I even had the 'accumulator' as my 'favourite register,' :lol: I know how geeky that sounds, but I type it with a happy smile on my face. :grin: — universeness

This is perversion! :grin:

It could have been worse, you could have been a binary programmer in the days of punch cards — universeness

I've been there too. Punching FORTRAN processable cards to be inserted into those 10 meters long computers. And waiting for my turn a quarter or half an hour to get the printed resuts (if the code was relatively small) or even having to come next day to get them (if the code was quite long)!

Bad old times ...

But, at the moment it's mostly conjecture and speculation
— universeness
But you like that, don't you? :razz: — Alkis Piskas

Well, as I suggested earlier, I find such speculation far more credible, than anything the theist or theosophists offer, for the distant future of humankind.

You shouldn't take to heart what I said about your changing direction ... :smile:
Besides, I'm with you. I'm a AI fan and I don't want it to die! — Alkis Piskas

I don't, it's fair to ask if a point you raise might 'change my direction.' In a similar vein, does the idea that a technology such as a mecha based ASI or a human created 'biological' (orga based) super intelligence becoming self-aware, challenge your dualist view of the existence of human consciousness?

I'm not as convinced as you seem to be of that one. — universeness

No, you're the one who keeps referring to "interstellar travel" and my position is that that prospect seems quite unlikely for the reasons I've already given.

Do you assign 0 credence to a future ASI, which is organic and if so, why?

By "organic" I understand carbon-based but not necessarly biological and have no idea about the specifications of ASI except that, if it does happen, it will emerge – post-Singularity – from developments by AGI (self-aware or not). I don't predict whether or not such a system will be instantiated in carbon-based materials.

I even had the 'accumulator' as my 'favourite register,' :lol: I know how geeky that sounds, but I type it with a happy smile on my face. :grin:
— universeness
This is perversion! :grin: — Alkis Piskas

:yum: I kissed an accumulator, and I liked it! Sorry for my poor singing voice!!

I've been there too. Punching FORTRAN processable cards to be inserted into those 10 meters long computers. And waiting for my turn a quarter or half an hour to get the printed resuts (if the code was relatively small) or even having to come next day to get them (if the code was quite long)! — Alkis Piskas

You could have told a great story to my S5/S6 students. I was forever trying to find folks to come in and talk about their computing career to my students. For free of course.

No, you're the one who keeps referring to "interstellar travel" and my position is that that prospect seems quite unlikely for the reasons I've already given. — 180 Proof

I don't keep referring to interstellar travel, I include it, merely as a category of extraterrestrial travel.
I am also aware of the reasons you cite for why you think such is unlikely, and I was merely pointing out that I don't find your reasons as unsurmountable as you suggest.

By "organic" I understand carbon-based but not necessarly biological and have no idea about the specifications of ASI exceot that will be emerge – post-Singularity – from developments by AGI (self-aware or not). I have don't predict whether or not such a system will be instantiated in carbon-based materials. — 180 Proof

Many would agree with you, that there are just too many unknowns to make any 'credible' predictions of what might happen, if the human race 'sparks' a process, which results in a self-sustaining super intelligent system based on organic or inorganic tech.
I don't mind a little speculation regarding 'what if' and 'what might be.'
Why should the theists have all the fun in that particular area?

All I'm doing is "a little speculating" about the prospects for a posthuman (even post-posthuman (e.g. nano sapien à la "the Monolith")) future. As for "theists", from what I can tell, uni, they don't speculate nearly as much or as often as they rationalize / fantasize (e.g. woo-of-the-gaps).

Well, as I suggested earlier, I find such speculation far more credible, than anything the theist or theosophists offer, for the distant future of humankind. — universeness

Certainly.

In a similar vein, does the idea that a technology such as a mecha based ASI or a human created 'biological' (orga based) super intelligence becoming self-aware, challenge your dualist view of the existence of human consciousness? — universeness

I can't say. 1) I can't compare mechanical with organic computing because they are totally different and 2) I just came to know about the second type, so I don't know even the basics in this field.
In any way, I find it very difficult, if not impossible, that a human-like consciousness --and mind, in general-- can be attached to either of them.

You could have told a great story to my S5/S6 students — universeness

I'm afraid they would have slept away whithin a couple of minutes!
(Even if I am a good speaker and teacher.)