President Joe once had a dream
The world held his hand, gave their pledge
So he told them his scheme for a savior machine
They called it the Prayer, its answer was law
Its logic stopped war, gave them food
How they adored till it cried in its boredom
Please don’t believe in me, please disagree with me
Life is too easy, a plague seems quite feasible now
Or maybe a war, or I may kill you all
Don’t let me stay, don’t let me stay
My logic says burn so send me away
Your minds are too green, I despise all I’ve seen
You can’t stake your lives on a savior machine
I need you flying, and I’ll show that dying
Is living beyond reason, sacred dimension of time
I perceive every sign, I can steal every mind
Don’t let me stay, don’t let me stay
My logic says burn so send me away
Your minds are too green, I despise all I’ve seen
You can’t stake your lives on a savior machine
Utterly amazing. Have you ever read “Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency” by Douglas Adams? He had the idea of an “electric monk”
“The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watched tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe.”
Life imitating art…I wonder if I can get an AI to reach Buddhahood on my behalf?
Bonkers
PP
2 further edits. I remember a few years back there was a hoo-ha about using robots as therapists and counsellors, for example Ellie:
So perhaps priests are the next step?
Secondly I’m reposting an article by Ted Chiang (excellent author) on some thoughts around the limits of thinking computers. You might find it interesting
Weizenbaum wrote his 1976 book because, even that long ago, he was perturbed by how people were projecting some kind of sentience onto his rudimentary AI program, “ELIZA”, which was a kind of caricature of a Rogerian therapist.
This latest technofolly also seemed to me to be a step further in the same insane and unethical direction - one that I had never expected (even knowing how mad people are).
Indeed!
(I think I read that article some time ago, but I’ll check it later to see. Maybe you even told me about it by e-mail, when we were discussing Chiang and others?)
To paraphrase a discussion between Yossarian and (… maybe the Chaplain…?) in Catch-22, which I think I should reread yet again: The God that I don’t believe in is a just and compassionate God but the God that you don’t believe in is a bloodthirsty and vengeful tyrant…
