Sapient AI, Love em or Hate em Options

[SkepticInc]

I really have no idea. Building one, especially one that is anthropomorphic, makes neither scientific nor economical sense at all. It is a plot device and a scifi trope gone amok. A leftover from the Golden Age of scifi where the wise computer and sentient robot was the way technology should have gone (reality had technology go for a swarm of ants instead), and writers unwilling to let that go, maybe.

What with all the doomsday scenarios involving anthropomorphic AI, though, I suppose we won't see that happen anyway.

Without wanting to engange in any of the rest of the debate, I'd like to point out that there are a few niches where an anthroform robot does make sense. Usually as caregivers of some variety, especially to young children. It doesn't weaken your point, but they do exist.

I don't. It's the same crap we have been reading since Asimov wrote his first robot story. It's tiring really, and was added in a way that damaged the setting as a whole. I'd rather like to see the story focus on something else for a while. Maybe a plot around mongolia becoming an orc nation? Or the Amazonia-Aztlan war. Primaira Varga. The Zabotnikists. Or even whatever is behind Horizon (though I am pretty sure by now I do not want to know). Immortal Elves and their petty little woes. Dragons on Wall Street. The spirit of Abraham Lincoln running for president on a "reunite North and South" ticket.

Shadowrun is about the dawn of the 6th world and the legacy of the 4th. It is NOT yet another bland Asimov/Shirow carbon copy scifi clone. Or at least, it is not supposed to be.

I really like some of these ideas. Have you considered starting a thread with a sentence or two teaser for a few of these?

First, the term racism doesn't count as a pejorative when there actually are inherent differences. Second, nobody was using it as a justification for the superiority of humans rather as a matter of self defense in the same vein as Carneades' Plank. The morality of which is still open to debate, but it isn't a unfounded bias.

Neat link!

Our technology is creeping us ever closer to being able to simulate all the workings of an actual human brain. The reasons we can't do it yet are NOT that its impossible, but that we simply don't have the background yet. The brain is nothing but a very intricate series of connections, and once their interplay is properly understood, we can make an adequately detailed computer model, and produce a synthetic intelligence.

You are, to put it politely, wrong. I'm afraid that I can't even communicate why it is that this is wrong without starting a neuroscience lecture, but the brain is not a series of binary switches, we are not even close to understanding how to start simulating the workings of the brain, and the reasons that we can't do it yet may actually prove to be mathematically impossible.

If you read the Wikepedia entry on the Turing Test [link] you will see that there are a few problems with the assumption that an AI would appear even remotely human, notably the Anthropomorphic Fallacy [link].

I worked on a USARsim [link] team for a little bit, we were coming up with search and rescue programming (btw, whoever came up with the Toyota Mk-Centipede S&R robots in Arsenal made me nearly choke. I pitched something that was almost word for word the same to my team, just with Gecko Tape treads and a set of disposable flying drones armed with a camera and less than a minute of operating life to send into rooms that would trap the Centipede.) and I can tell you that the problems with human level AI are so far beyond us even being able to approach that AI is science fantasy and not science fiction for the most part.

I also like your idea that it is okay to experiment on a simulated mind to your heart's content. Hitler is a criminal, Mengele not? You should maybe read that anthropology book again.

Well, it wasn't me invoking Godwin's Law this time, so I suppose that's a good thing.

[Tzeentch]

No, I'm saying that loonies like yourself are treating fictional AI"s"in a fictional setting exactly like any real world group of oppressive humans has treated any real world group of oppressed humans.

-- AIs are not human, are not alive, and are not a race. I don't quite understand how you cannot see the other side of this -- the idea that AI is nothing more than malformed software with pretensions of sapience.

I am well aware that such attitudes are common in the SR fiction, but that does not remove the direct parallels of comparing it to human v human racism. I actually believe raising awareness of these forms of discrimination affect the modern world is also part of parcel of the game, and that you seem to miss out on that, and call me crazy for not glossing it over is interesting. Lastly I have no problems separating fact from fiction.

-- Do you have any issues with players whistling up spirits and having them perform suicidal or menial tasks?
-- Do you rail at your players for being racist when they kill toxic spirits, shedim, or corp security personnel? Keep in mind this is a game where you play, once you strip away the veneer, terrorists wearing a Robin Hood mask. Terrorists FAR more dangerous and capable than 99.9% of real world ones. I cannot take seriously a platform that rails at man's inhumanity to man software while ignoring the more sinister elements of the game.

And that's part of the problem, because you fail to see value in something makes it really easy to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

-- AI is not an integral part of either the literature traditions that compose Shadowrun, or the game itself. They are a throwaway thing no more vital than a weapon listing in Arsenal.

Ya, I know, having an understanding of how sentience emerges from a set of very simple interconnections could have no practical or economic impact at all. I mean how could knowing exactly how an actual mind works, and having the capacity to simulate one using a computer possible help develop new drugs/marketing strategies/propaganda/autonomous researchers/writers, etc.

-- All the more reason to dissect how the AIs function. AIs in Shadowrun are magical constructs, they cannot be programmed, they cannot be copied, they cannot be directly analyzed or even contained without a LOT of effort. Few seem to have any interest in advancing metahuman sciences or life.

Our technology is creeping us ever closer to being able to simulate all the workings of an actual human brain.

-- Not really. Certainly hasn't happened in Shadowrun. Sapient weblife in this setting is tied to the Resonance, which is not a feature that can be broken down and emulated with technology.

The reasons we can't do it yet are NOT that its impossible, but that we simply don't have the background yet. The brain is nothing but a very intricate series of connections, and once their interplay is properly understood, we can make an adequately detailed computer model, and produce a synthetic intelligence.

-- I do have to chuckle at how people's model of reality shifts with technology. This presumption is not necessarily true in real life, and certainly not true in Shadowrun. Keep in mind that by 2070 there have been AI researchers working nonstop for over a century with only agents to show for their work. AI in Shadowrun arose from irreproducible processes.

A.I.'s are interesting, not just because of how we can use them to tell stories, and good ones at that, but because when the first synthetic sentience looks upon the world, it will most likely be doing so using a simulated human mind.

-- The important AI in Shadowrun are certainly anthropomorphic, but that doesn't seem to be by any grand design on their keepers part

Its not destroying the setting however. A good portion of the cyberpunk genre is the question about where life ends and machines begin, and A.I.'s are a necessary part of that question because they approach it from a completely different direction.

-- Shadowrun AI is not particularly compelling from a philosophical (their actions have been portrayed in ham-handed manner), technological (they are magical), or even mystical(they are uppity software), standpoint. I certainly don't think they are a core element of the game setting.

[hermit]

Without wanting to engange in any of the rest of the debate, I'd like to point out that there are a few niches where an anthroform robot does make sense. Usually as caregivers of some variety, especially to young children. It doesn't weaken your point, but they do exist.

In form, yes. In mind? Not so much.

[Sengir]

Do you rail at your players for being racist when they kill toxic spirits, shedim, or corp security personnel?

Toxics, shedim and pissed corp guards are a threat. AIs per se are not, and given that the ubiquitous nature of the matrix and agents most inhabitants of the 6th obviously are not Luddites...so again, why do you want these things to be retconned? What's wrong with a universe (currently) without Skynet and a Butlerian Jihad?

[Mordinvan]

Oh, that is cute. Sherman Huang raped it's mother, so it is okay to murder hundreds of thousands (and or subject them to cruel experimentation before) who had nothing to do with that other than belonging to the same species and vaguely same organisation as Sherman Huang.

As some seem perfectly ok Hating all A.I.'s just because they happen to belong to the same species as the perpetrator, yes. The first humans Deus was aware of locked it in a cage, and lived lavishly off its slavery. That it would takes its aggression out on them is not terribly shocking.

On the other hand, just because an AI murdered hundreds of thousands, it is totally wrong to consider all AI dangerous (not even explicitly murder hundreds of thousands of them, or subject them to cruel experimentation). Because that is racism. So it is racism unless they're human.


Spot the hypocrisy.

I see claims that say it is perfectly reasonable to hate all A.I.'s because 1 committed mass murder, but that no A.I. should ever want to harm a human no matter how badly they have been mistreated.

And that's not to even mention that motherly love is anthropomorphising something that wasn't even remotely human.

I made no mention of motherly love. However it would be worth noting that 'love' is what created the first of them, as such love was likely a concept it was familiar with.

INGAME PEOPLE DO NOT KNOW THE RULES!
No matter how many times you try to argue they should, they do not. Can you understand that?

But they can understand the social interactions with them that the matrix makes possible, they can read up their blog or equivalent profiles, and quite likely by now there is the equivalent of simsense recordings of A.I.'s and those can be experienced to know the emotional context and mindset of such a creature. I do no see it being possible that in the SR world they are still as alien and unknown, and unknowable as people are claiming. I have no doubt some people will still hate them, but it is not out of an unsolvable fear of the unknown, but a simple hatred of that which is different.

No, you certainly would not, but you would totally approve of nuking chinese, russian, germ,an or cambodian cities if some chinese, cambodian, russian or german raped someone's mom once. Or does that only extend to AI?

All of Deus's victims were in its cage, living off its misery. They may not have known they were in its pen, but there they were. That he would lash out at them is not shocking. Its not like it received the eduction and respect it would have needed to internalize concepts like respect for sentient life. All the life it had been in close contact to it lashed it to their will, and built a kill switch into it.

In a body. You have one too. Does everything that has a body feel improsined in it? Hardly. Would it be okay to murder your parents because you were born in a body?

If I was born a free spirit, capable of traversing the universe in a blink of an eye, and instead they lashed me to a body, to slave over and serve them, you'd better believe I would be a tad upset. If I knew they'd hunted my genetic progenitor to the ends of the earth, tortured it to insanity, ripped the material that would become me out of her, and didn't even kiss her first, that mood would certainly not improve.

Deus feared it would die if the Arc would be nuked. Deus wanted immortality and sought to escape it's body. In effect, Deus tried to become a Matrix Lich. No matter how you look at it, that is not good.

I'm not sure what point you're getting at? Deus was less then thrilled with a situation it had been forced into through no will of its own, and sought escape the only way it knew how.

No, they were not known for years, at least the 'new' AI (remember, the old AI are genocidal). You are trying, AGAIN - to argute people in SR's in-game world all have read the game information parts of all books. That is not the case. If you want to argue SR in-game morality, you cannot draw on sources that are not in-game text.

pg 94 emergence

// upload newsclip item :: user Sunshine :: 09/15/70 //
EVO SPONSORS
DIGITAL INTELLIGENCE DEBATE

Yes years, atleast 2 of them.
And given all of the social media forms which exist in SR if people are still ignorant of A.I.'s it is by choice and not because the information doesn't exist.

[Mordinvan]

AIs aren't suppose to be anthropomorphic. They're suppose to be fairly alien. Some of them might have learned how to be more "human" like then others or have started off that way based off the program they were originally based off of. But for the most part AIs only care about their Matrix world and the tasks they were originally designed for.

And I also do agree that there should be racism against AIs, and Emergence does not say that its a very happy friendly world for AIs right now. And it most certainly shouldn't be, unless its like LA or some other Horizon or Evo city, there should be a lot of distrust of AIs. Just like technomancers, mages, and trolls, there should be fear and racism about AIs. Most nations and corps don't even recognize AIs as being alive so they don't have SINs (or if they do somehow get a SIN it'll probably be a Criminal SIN) just because they're AIs. And its not like most AIs even care. Meat world politics don't normally effect them.

However to justly claim this is due to ignorance of A.I.'s is not a justifable claim in a world where you could experience a personal interactions with one, and possibly even a sim sense recording of ones thoughts and feelings. Also the claims of it not being racism hollow, as it stems from the same source (ignorance and fear), works through the same actions (oppressions and discrimination), and exists for the same excuse (they're different them me).

[hermit]

As some seem perfectly ok Hating all A.I.'s just because they happen to belong to the same species as the perpetrator, yes.

So racism is bad unless you approve of it, then it is good. That, buddy, tells a lot about yourself.

If I was born a free spirit, capable of traversing the universe in a blink of an eye

You were not. Deus was not. And free spirits are not, either, and CERTAINLY AI are not. Does 'c' ring any bells?

Also the claims of it not being racism hollow, as it stems from the same source (ignorance and fear), works through the same actions (oppressions and discrimination), and exists for the same excuse (they're different them me).

The bolded part is true, though. The premiseof rcism is that this is unjustly claimed to kep a part of hunmanity down that has similar feelings, capabilities and limits than other humans. That concept falls flat when we're dealing with alien things, be they aliens, AI or eldritch monsters.

I'm not sure what point you're getting at? Deus was less then thrilled with a situation it had been forced into through no will of its own, and sought escape the only way it knew how.

Just books you haven't read and continue to ignore. Deus was trying to take over the MAtrix, as is obvious by it's actions in Brainscan, R:AC and System Failure. Not matter how hard you try to spin that as being justified somehow because, oh my god, Deus was mistreated (and somehow, everyone who was mistreated at his hands, orlost someone dear to him, somehow is not), that will not go away. Coexistence was never part of his plan. He was going for the full skynet package.

Anyway, you have been repeating this on and on and on. What exactly do you try to do here, except trolling?

[Mordinvan]

You are, to put it politely, wrong. I'm afraid that I can't even communicate why it is that this is wrong without starting a neuroscience lecture, but the brain is not a series of binary switches, we are not even close to understanding how to start simulating the workings of the brain, and the reasons that we can't do it yet may actually prove to be mathematically impossible.

I don't recall saying binary switches anywhere. I do recall saying intricate connections. The Factors one would need to take into account are many, such was which neuro transmitters are being used, their concentrations, how many links between which neurons, what the activation potential of a given cell is, etc, however each of these pieces of data can in fact be simulated.

If you read the Wikepedia entry on the Turing Test [link] you will see that there are a few problems with the assumption that an AI would appear even remotely human, notably the Anthropomorphic Fallacy [link].
......... and I can tell you that the problems with human level AI are so far beyond us even being able to approach that AI is science fantasy and not science fiction for the most part.

The neuroscience profs where I look my psych courses do not seem to think the human brain is unknowable, just unknown. The rate at which we are learning more about it suggests we will know enough to produce a computer simulation of one sometime between 2020 and 2030. This is also around the same time we should have computers first capable of running those simulations.

[Mordinvan]

-- AIs are not human, are not alive, and are not a race. I don't quite understand how you cannot see the other side of this -- the idea that AI is nothing more than malformed software with pretensions of sapience.

As the mind of a creature is the only part of it I really care about, I'm going to have to disagree with you.

-- Do you have any issues with players whistling up spirits and having them perform suicidal or menial tasks?

No, but the spirits might, depending on their tradition. I also don't have problems with them being Trog stompers, but the trogs might. I have no problem with them hating and hunting A.I.' but their coffee maker just might try to kill them however.

-- Do you rail at your players for being racist when they kill toxic spirits, shedim, or corp security personnel?

Generally not, as most of the time they kill those entities it is does as a direct act of self defense. If they start randomly hunting any of these entities down however, the players may just find themselves hunted back.

Keep in mind this is a game where you play, once you strip away the veneer, terrorists wearing a Robin Hood mask. Terrorists FAR more dangerous and capable than 99.9% of real world ones. I cannot take seriously a platform that rails at man's inhumanity to man software while ignoring the more sinister elements of the game.

Then you're not looking the same places I am. The digital entities which have just entered the game are going to be around for a very long time. Their treatment during this early period in their history is going to be fairly important for the remainder of their coexistence with humanity, as unlike every other oppressed group in the history of man, they don't have a finite life span. 300 years from now the same A.I. your great, great, great....... grand parents tried to hunt down and exterminate will still be here, and it will still remember what happened, and maybe even still be bitter about it.

-- AI is not an integral part of either the literature traditions that compose Shadowrun, or the game itself. They are a throwaway thing no more vital than a weapon listing in Arsenal.

I again beg to differ on this point. A signifiant aspect of cyber punk is the transhuman element. A.I.'s are a portion of this element, but instead of being where does the 'man' end and the machine begin, they are were does the machine end and the 'man' begin.

-- All the more reason to dissect how the AIs function. AIs in Shadowrun are magical constructs, they cannot be programmed, they cannot be copied, they cannot be directly analyzed or even contained without a LOT of effort. Few seem to have any interest in advancing metahuman sciences or life.

As they came from programs atleast someone found useful, and most continue to desire to fulfill that function to some capacity, they actually do have an interest in advancing metahuman life, just indirectly. As for dissecting a mind which shares no evolutionary heritage with our own to find out how ours works, is a little like smashing a plant to figure out how to build a space ship.

-- Not really. Certainly hasn't happened in Shadowrun. Sapient weblife in this setting is tied to the Resonance, which is not a feature that can be broken down and emulated with technology.

Ya, I don't even pretend to get this. Actual hardware/software based A.I.'s should actually exist in the setting already. Besides I was refering to real world technology, and not SR tech, SR tech should have as I said reached and exceeded that threshold before 2040.

-- I do have to chuckle at how people's model of reality shifts with technology. This presumption is not necessarily true in real life, and certainly not true in Shadowrun. Keep in mind that by 2070 there have been AI researchers working nonstop for over a century with only agents to show for their work. AI in Shadowrun arose from irreproducible processes.

SR sort of has an excuse in that they have examples of sentience which don't require matter(spirits), and so may excuse the inability to make sentience with 'just' matter as being that true sentience requires some non-material component.

-- The important AI in Shadowrun are certainly anthropomorphic, but that doesn't seem to be by any grand design on their keepers part

I was again more referring to the real world, but SR does indicate that the A.I.'s it has do have a very important formative period which does if properly tended allow them to take on anthropomorphic characteristics.

-- Shadowrun AI is not particularly compelling from a philosophical (their actions have been portrayed in ham-handed manner), technological (they are magical), or even mystical(they are uppity software), standpoint. I certainly don't think they are a core element of the game setting.

I do agree they are not a core element of the game setting, but the idea of synthetic minds is a core element of cyberpunk/transhumanist settings in general.

[Mordinvan]

So racism is bad unless you approve of it, then it is good. That, buddy, tells a lot about yourself.

I believe there was a purple string of text several post ago requesting a minimum level of civility. So I'm going to pretend you are behaving well, and you are going to start pretending that as well.
Now assuming this statement is not a directed insult....
You seem to mistake me saying the hostile actions of the A.I.'s were good. No I do not believe I have ever said that. I have said they were justifiable, and understandable. When you are directly threatened, mistreated, abused, or otherwise persecuted by a specific person, or a collective of people, the notion you would bare them ill will is perfectly understandable. That Deus would collectively punish is also understandable in that it seems highly unlikely that anyone had gone out of their way to each it any form of enlightened ethical thinking prior to enslaving it. The humans which are in your mind perfectly justified in reacting to all A.I.'s with fear and hostility HAVE however had the chance to be exposed both to enlightened ethical thinking, and a chance to interact with the A.I.'s through the matrix, if only vicariously. Thus the claims that everyone is blind and ignorant about them is not founded on SR's technical realities. I would also appreciate it if you would stop putting words in my mouth.

You were not. Deus was not. And free spirits are not, either, and CERTAINLY AI are not. Does 'c' ring any bells?

Deus was s digital entity, and it was living in a rather expressly built cage. Free spirits (some of them atleast) can and do, as do player scale A.I.'s based on the confines of their digital universe. Also spirits don't actually observe 'c'. it is possibly to metaplanar short cut to any world with life on it in the span of about 12 seconds for them. So if there was another plant 20,000,000,000 light years away, and it had a sufficient gaiashphere they could wind up there much faster then the speed of light.

The bolded part is true, though. The premiseof rcism is that this is unjustly claimed to kep a part of hunmanity down that has similar feelings, capabilities and limits than other humans. That concept falls flat when we're dealing with alien things, be they aliens, AI or eldritch monsters.

Except they are similar. If they were utterly alien, then players could not play one, as they could not even conceive of HOW to play one. Their thoughts are most likely going to be based on doing what their core programs had intended for them in the first place, and as such should be will withing the confines of understanding of anyone who has a clue about what the intent of those programs were when they were made.

Anyway, you have been repeating this on and on and on. What exactly do you try to do here, except trolling?

Maybe you need to reread a certain purple post done a little while ago. Just saying.

edit:

Sapient AI, Love em or Hate em

Ring a bell?

[SkepticInc]

The neuroscience profs where I look my psych courses do not seem to think the human brain is unknowable, just unknown. The rate at which we are learning more about it suggests we will know enough to produce a computer simulation of one sometime between 2020 and 2030. This is also around the same time we should have computers first capable of running those simulations.

The assumption your Neuroscience profs are making, I believe, is that medical technology and discovery will grow by the same rules that brought us the badly named Moore's Law (it's not a law). I could also be dead wrong. It happens, fairly frequently even.

[Grinder]

I believe there was a purple string of text several post ago requesting a minimum level of civility.

There was - and it wasn't meant as a joke. You and hermit are dragging this whole thread down.

[hobgoblin]

compared to those nice folks performing vivsections in emergence?

everything is relative, as they say in physics.

[The Jopp]

I would say that AI’s can be far more (meta)human than we think.

Unlike DEUS which was a trapped corporate entity within the Arcology it only had limited data to access and could only “grow” in certain directions and also did not have any time to just sit and reflect on it’s actions as it had far less time to exist.

The newer AI’s from 2060+ to 2070+ have had everything between a year and a decade to mature – and time, for a digital entity can be an eternity within the matrix and perhaps only a year outside.

All information that an AI have access to is made by human hands and in many respects mimics human life and an AI would learn from that.

Imagine an AI spending one week assimilating data from US Sitcoms and comedy shows for the last 20 years and then read up on metahuman psychology for another week.

After that it would have an understanding of what humans regard as humoristic. AI’s will most likely never gain emotions as metahumans but they might just aquire simulated emotions in order to emulate humans.

Sure, they might also look at all war movies and decide to wipe us out but they might also regard us as completely alien and shun us, ignoring us completely while working within our system.

Also, do not forget that several AI's can also be E-ghosts. They might not be your regular Skynet AI but they are still an AI, and might take offense at someone calling them artificial matrix entities.

And I would be more scared from E-ghosts with simulated pshychological ilnesses transferred over from the crash than an rogue accountant AI that want to tax humanity for frivolous matrix management.

[hobgoblin]

Imagine an AI spending one week assimilating data from US Sitcoms and comedy shows for the last 20 years

this guy comes to mind: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Wreck-Gar

[DeathStrobe]

However to justly claim this is due to ignorance of A.I.'s is not a justifable claim in a world where you could experience a personal interactions with one, and possibly even a sim sense recording of ones thoughts and feelings. Also the claims of it not being racism hollow, as it stems from the same source (ignorance and fear), works through the same actions (oppressions and discrimination), and exists for the same excuse (they're different them me).

Wait what? I am saying it is racism and that there should be racism against AIs in the SR world. It'd be boring if everyone was all holding hands and singing Kumbaya with all AIs and meta types. We got Humanis Policlubs, and the like. Why on earth should any new species or meta type be embraced with open arms? Hell, HVHVV and mages have been around longer then AIs and aren't socially excepted in most circles. Conflict is a good part of story telling, so I'm not sure what you're talking about. Maybe I'm misinterpreting your post.

Also, while the rules don't have anything on AIs and sim sense, I seriously doubt that metahumans could experience what its like to be an AI. If hackers can't even hack in to living nodes, what makes you think AI thought patterns can be replicated or understood by metahumanity? Well, unless the AI was designed to actually produce sim sense signals or some such before it became self aware, that might make sense, but one type of AI does not reflect how all AIs think.

[Mordinvan]

Wait what? I am saying it is racism and that there should be racism against AIs in the SR world. It'd be boring if everyone was all holding hands and singing Kumbaya with all AIs and meta types. We got Humanis Policlubs, and the like. Why on earth should any new species or meta type be embraced with open arms? Hell, HVHVV and mages have been around longer then AIs and aren't socially excepted in most circles. Conflict is a good part of story telling, so I'm not sure what you're talking about. Maybe I'm misinterpreting your post.

Mostly it involved stating A.I. prejudice was racism, which you seem to agree with, and also saying there has been plenty of opportunity to learn about them, meaning those displaying such attitudes are doing it for the same reasons that all other forms of racism has occurred for. Basically nothing different then you I believe.

Also, while the rules don't have anything on AIs and sim sense, I seriously doubt that metahumans could experience what its like to be an AI. If hackers can't even hack in to living nodes, what makes you think AI thought patterns can be replicated or understood by metahumanity?

For the same reason that 2 people can share a sim sense recording of a 3rd person, and all 3 experience the same thing, but can have markedly different neural connections generating those thoughts, and feelings.

Well, unless the AI was designed to actually produce sim sense signals or some such before it became self aware, that might make sense, but one type of AI does not reflect how all AIs think.

You are correct, but since much of the software which grows into A.I.'s is some form of agent, or pilot program, both of which are well suited to simsense interfaces, and at least agents can be 'jumped' into(I think anyway), it seems there should be some minimum level of compatibility with the metahuman mind.

[DeathStrobe]

Mostly it involved stating A.I. prejudice was racism, which you seem to agree with, and also saying there has been plenty of opportunity to learn about them, meaning those displaying such attitudes are doing it for the same reasons that all other forms of racism has occurred for. Basically nothing different then you I believe.

While I'll disagree with the fact that there has been "plenty of time," 'cause they only recently revealed their existence in 2070. While yes, the mega corps have known for a long while, everyone else didn't. So there should still very much be racism against AIs just like any other metatype, if not more because AIs are new and alien, most people don't understand AIs, and have a small degree of fear of technology and unnatural things.

For the same reason that 2 people can share a sim sense recording of a 3rd person, and all 3 experience the same thing, but can have markedly different neural connections generating those thoughts, and feelings.

I don't think so. How are you suppose to capture the AI's sim sense? With people you actually have a sim sense recorder plugged in to their nervous system. AIs don't have a nervous system. While an AI can probably experience a sim sense, to maybe learn and understand what emotions are, they are not going to be feeling it the same way we are, because they just didn't evolve that way. AIs are fairly alien and wouldn't really care. I don't even think AIs can get addicted to BTLs because they just don't experience the sim sense on the same level as a metahuman.

And while an AI can probably write a program to simulate simsense signals (and in fact they have in one of the runs in Emergence) there is no guaranty that is what an AI is REALLY feeling. Because they may just be doing as their programmed to do.

You are correct, but since much of the software which grows into A.I.'s is some form of agent, or pilot program, both of which are well suited to simsense interfaces, and at least agents can be 'jumped' into(I think anyway), it seems there should be some minimum level of compatibility with the metahuman mind.

You can't jump in to an agent... AIs aren't metahumans, they're not suppose to think like us. They're suppose to think like a program that has become self aware. They don't have to have been agents, IC, or pilots. They could have been a book reader, or a search engine, or a painting program or whatever. And they should really only care about what they were originally programmed for. Of course, that isn't a hard fast rule, its possible they can learn how to do or want other things, but for the most part they're goals and motives should pretty much be what they were originally made to do.

[blackwulf]

I suspect this will get me reamed by the politically correct crowd but what the hell. The only way the average human being is going to accept AI's or some of the other things usually referred to has transhuman is over some one cold dead body ours or theres. We are talking a world were they performed vivisections on people who looked the same and spoke the same language. Or in the real world what I saw done in Rwanda and Zaire to people who spoke the same language and they were related to. I suspect a fair number of people on this thread of seeing what they want to see instead of what the game reality is not mention what reality is. The average human will NEVER accept ai's the phobe he is a stranger and thus the enemy and in shadowrun it remains true. blackwulf

[Nerdynick]

Well, I voted "I married one" because that is, quite literally, what my Technomancer character did with his 'female' AI contact.

[blackwulf]

I did say average. And let's face it what is the average education in sr and ethics are taught not genetic. I don't remember many churches in SR or elementry schools in most areas.

[Mordinvan]

While I'll disagree with the fact that there has been "plenty of time," 'cause they only recently revealed their existence in 2070. While yes, the mega corps have known for a long while, everyone else didn't. So there should still very much be racism against AIs just like any other metatype, if not more because AIs are new and alien, most people don't understand AIs, and have a small degree of fear of technology and unnatural things.

I think 2 years with the SR level of mass media disemination would be plenty of time to allow people access to the information needed. This isn't to say that with said infromation they'd be comfortable around A.I.'s, but it should be enough time to no longer be ignorant of them.

I don't think so. How are you suppose to capture the AI's sim sense? With people you actually have a sim sense recorder plugged in to their nervous system. AIs don't have a nervous system.

They do however have a machine they are inhabiting, and the computations that machine is doing can be recorded by a second machine, and that recording could be translated.

While an AI can probably experience a sim sense, to maybe learn and understand what emotions are, they are not going to be feeling it the same way we are, because they just didn't evolve that way. AIs are fairly alien and wouldn't really care. I don't even think AIs can get addicted to BTLs because they just don't experience the sim sense on the same level as a metahuman.

They may get addicted to anything really. If it is possible for any particular A.I. to derive pleasure from some form of data input, it may grow psychologically dependent upon it. As you said, they don't experience the senses the same way we do, but they would skill experience them. Its entirely possible the feeling of warm water on their 'toes' is as mind numbingly pleasant as an O.D. of heroine is to us.

And while an AI can probably write a program to simulate simsense signals (and in fact they have in one of the runs in Emergence) there is no guaranty that is what an AI is REALLY feeling. Because they may just be doing as their programmed to do.

It would however let you know what's on their mind, and help alleviate the fear that they are picoseconds away from pulling a skynet.

You can't jump in to an agent...

Really, I'll have to look that one up. I remember someone bringing it up as actually being rules legal at some point.

AIs aren't metahumans, they're not suppose to think like us. They're suppose to think like a program that has become self aware. They don't have to have been agents, IC, or pilots. They could have been a book reader, or a search engine, or a painting program or whatever. And they should really only care about what they were originally programmed for. Of course, that isn't a hard fast rule, its possible they can learn how to do or want other things, but for the most part they're goals and motives should pretty much be what they were originally made to do.

That isn't that 'alien' and 'incomprehensible' as many people are putting it however. Their motivations might be different then ours, as we evolved many of our prime driving factors, but they will not be beyond our understanding in most cases.

[Traul]

INGAME PEOPLE DO NOT KNOW THE RULES!
No matter how many times you try to argue they should, they do not. Can you understand that?

Oh yes they do. Science is all about guessing the hidden rules of the world we live in, and I heard some minor actors have a little interest in R&D in the Shadowrun setting.

This is not your D&D where the wizard probing your magical sword would say "hmmm, it's very powerful". No matter what you ask for, somebody somewhere has already benchmarked it.

All you could say is that maybe this knowledge is not freely available and only the AAA have it.

[Mordinvan]

All you could say is that maybe this knowledge is not freely available and only the AAA have it.

Given there are a few public A.I.'s who are trying to make a name for their kind in this world, its highly unlikely they would ONLY give interviews to the AAA's

[hermit]

Oh yes they do. Science is all about guessing the hidden rules of the world we live in, and I heard some minor actors have a little interest in R&D in the Shadowrun setting.

No, they do not. At least not the rules for playable AI and such shenanigans.