budaatum:


And actually, it is those intending to insult that often call others materialists.
.

DeepSight:
Diridiri, let me ask you this. Do you think it is theoretically possible to create a machine that feels pain. I trust you to dwell carefully on this question. Try also not to be clouded by your default perspective thus far.

In this I would further ask you to answer the question with respect to -

1. Physical pain and
2. Emotional pain.

Thank you.

DeepSight:
Diridiri, let me ask you this. Do you think it is theoretically possible to create a machine that feels pain. I trust you to dwell carefully on this question. Try also not to be clouded by your default perspective thus far.

In this I would further ask you to answer the question with respect to -

1. Physical pain and
2. Emotional pain.

Thank you.

DeepSight:


I hope you are not conflating "materialist" as used in these discussions with "materialist" as used to refer to a person who is focused on worldly wealth.

materialist
/məˈtɪərɪəlɪst/
Learn to pronounce
noun
noun: materialist; plural noun: materialists

1.
a person who considers material possessions and physical comfort as more important than spiritual values.
"greedy materialists lusting for consumer baubles"
2.
Philosophy
a person who supports the theory that nothing exists except matter and its movements and modifications.
"an atheist and philosophical materialist"

LordReed:


Yes, I think it would be possible though for ethical reasons I would hope it will be a very limited sort of pain.

Pain is basically parts of the organism recording adverse events which are translated to "hypersignals" which we interpret as pain. A machine could be made to feel pain in the same manner, "hypersignals" the machine processing block will interpret as pain. But as I said this would be very questionable ethically because having the ability to do it doesn't mean we should or if at all necessary be very limited in capacity.

DeepSight:


Good question and the answer I believe is that such a field is purely intangible and can only be expressed in the physical realm through physical means. Physical expression being just one of virtually infinite forms of expression conceivable to it.

LordReed:


Also why would this droplet in an infinite field want to pass through the arduous and risky process called birth? And the process to even get to that point is so random you essentially don't know what you'll get until the formation of a physical body is underway. Isn’t that just too haphazard a process for something that purportedly emanates from a field of infinite possibilities?

BTW at what point does human foetus get a mind, immediately when the zygote starts dividing?

DeepSight:


How would you distinguish between the mere appearance of such hypersignals on your monitor and the machine actually feeling what we understand as pain.

LordReed:


Signal measurement can be divorced from their actual effects. For instance the strength of signal reaching your device can be measured without knowing the actual content the signals are carrying. The signals reaching your device are interpreted by your device to output the words you see now. Similarly it would be possible to see the "hypersignals" on a monitor but it would take the machine's processing block to interpret the signals as pain.

DeepSight:


I hope you are not doing with pain what Lawrence Krauss did with nothingness. Namely defining it as something else entirely and then developing your answers on the basis of that redefinition. Because I suppose that you, as a human understands that pain hurts. That its something you feel. The question is if you believe a machine can have the feeling of pain. Can it feel hurt, and feel pain, as we understand pain to be.

Any one can write a code and label it "pain" such that a robot can see that code and scream "yikes" or even say "oh I feel pain." You know very well, I trust, that such interpretation of any given signal is not the same thing as actually feeling pain.

I also added a bit to my last post - I said -

In short, does your answer take into consideration the distinction between the appearance of pain and actual pain? Because there are already robots that can simulate feelings of every kind - even read a human's feelings and respond appropriately. This is however altogether different from the machine actually having feelings of its own - or feeling pain. So how do you distinguish these, and how do they factor into your answer. Also you didnt really say anything about emotional pain which I mentioned.

LordReed:


I dunno how mean with reference to Krauss but I defined pain as interpretation of "hypersignals" recorded by an organism of adverse events. It is not merely seeing something labelled pain and saying yikes. The signals themselves are transmitting what you call pain. I went for a nerve conduction test and during the test they pass some sort of signal through your exposed skin. The very same signals that you are interpreting as mild tingling one moment become intense pain the next, why? Intensity which is why I use "hypersignal" to describe it. Another example is sound, the same sound that you find pleasant can be made very unpleasant by raising the intensity. A machine can be made to interpret signal intensity as pain same way a human interprets signal intensity as pain. There'd be no functional difference to the one experiencing it.

DeepSight:


1. I do note here that you say "recorded by an organism" and it is not clear to me that a machine is an organism.

2. Aside from this its rather dodgy to refer to pain as a record of an adverse event simply in order to make the definition machine-compliant. If we allow that we surely must agree that a flat tire or empty fuel tank in any sufficiently smart car could also be described as pain. That would be fraudulent.

3. Nonetheless, moving on from that are we to take it from your position that you also believe a machine could be contrived which falls in love in the sense we understand it, can be heartbroken in the sense we understand it, can feel grief, sorrow, joy, ecstasy. Can enjoy sex, can be sexually attracted to someone or something in the sense that we feel the pleasure of arousal and copulation, can taste food in the way that we do, can feel a pinch in the way that we do, can smell an odor in the way that we do.

In this, I hope you realize that creating a machine which can detect the microorganisms or chemicals which give rise to a specific smell in the air is different from saying that the machine experiences the nasty smell of say, shit for example. Because i am struggling with the fact that you seem to miss this basic distinction.

LordReed:


You have a funny adversarial approach I find disconcerting. One moment we are talking without recrimination and expressing ideas next moment you jump to accusing one of bad intentions. I don't like dicussing with people who can't keep things on an even keel. WTF have I said now that requires you to say I am dodging?

DeepSight:


Calm down, I meant no harm by describing something you said as dodgy. I simply mean it stands on suspiciously weak grounds. The definition in red below -

dodgy
/ˈdɒdʒi/
Learn to pronounce
adjective informal•British
adjective: dodgy; comparative adjective: dodgier; superlative adjective: dodgiest

dishonest or unreliable.
"a dodgy second-hand car salesman"

potentially dangerous.
"activities like these could be dodgy for your heart"

of low quality.
"Spurs' dodgy defence had thrown away a 2-0 lead"

Besides, even if I did say something was dodgy in the dishonest sense, I hardly expect you to throw a tantrum. Its par for the course in discourse such as this.

Now man up, and lets carry on.

LordReed:


If you want a decent discussion with me refrain from making such accusations, they are uncalled for. You are the one who should man up and have the patience to ask questions and wait to get answers before you start throwing around hurtful words. I asked you several questions which you are yet to answer but you don't see me calling you dodgy or something. I am more man in that respect than you have shown.

DeepSight:
LordReed, I am generally taken aback by your suggestion that a robot or machine can feel pain. I really feel quite at a loss for words, but more importantly I feel that this suggestion really amounts to going too far on your part - in a desperate bid to foist consciousness on matter.

I would recommend this very short write-up to you, which I believe captures things succinctly enough, if you will heed -

https://mindmatters.ai/2021/02/can-robots-be-engineered-to-actually-feel-pain/

LordReed:


LMFAO! The article feels so shortsighted I can't but laugh. The author seems to believe that because machines cannot currently have an internally consistent and continuous experience therefore they never will, that is myopic to almost being luddite.

DeepSight:


Well I can only say that I am surprised and rather disappointed with this unnecessary tantrum over nothing.
Would never have expected it from you.
Go cool off.
All the best.

LordReed:

I don't give a rats arse what you expected. You called on me to give my take on something to which i responded but I am the dodgy one while you tell me to "Je brake" when I ask you questions. You can Bleep off on your high hypocritical horse.

DeepSight:
Diridiri, let me ask you this. Do you think it is theoretically possible to create a machine that feels pain. I trust you to dwell carefully on this question. Try also not to be clouded by your default perspective thus far.

In this I would further ask you to answer the question with respect to -

1. Physical pain and
2. Emotional pain.

Thank you.

diridiri:


My answer to both questions is: "I don't see why not".
I have yet to be given a convincing reason as to why any of this is or should be theoretically impossible. It definitely doesn't seem mechanically impossible.

DeepSight:
LordReed, I am generally taken aback by your suggestion that a robot or machine can feel pain. I really feel quite at a loss for words, but more importantly I feel that this suggestion really amounts to going too far on your part - in a desperate bid to foist consciousness on matter.

I would recommend this very short write-up to you, which I believe captures things succinctly enough, if you will heed -

https://mindmatters.ai/2021/02/can-robots-be-engineered-to-actually-feel-pain/

Granted, his is a minimal self, in the sense that he lacks reason and moral choice. But it is a self. He experiences life as a dog and he has feelings and opinions generated by that experience. A robot is not alive and does not have a self of any kind. There is no known way to cause a robot to have a subjective consciousness, which the dog naturally does. So roboticists resort to fudging between simulations of feeling and actual feeling.

Yes, provided that that is what the robot was programmed to do. There is no “self” in there. Not in the sense that, when a puppy is trained to heel or fetch, or avoid jumping up on guests, we are communicating with his “self,” to instill proper social behavior. We don’t program the puppy. We teach him, the way his mother would — except that we teach him different things.

Absolutely, and the discover that the human brain can manipulate electronic signals quite efficiently — if the interface is delicate enough — is the most promising development in prosthetics in many decades. But, to be clear, it is the human who is experiencing the sensation; the robotics is merely obeying commands from the central nervous system.

Agan, “empathize” is in quotation marks. Because, the reality, unwilling as the roboticists are to admit it, is that only life forms can empathize — because only life forms can actually suffer. A robot can be programmed cleverly to appear to empathize or suffer. But there is nothing in there but programming.

Life forms — human, animal, plant, fungus — communicate in various ways, usually with others of their kind. They are alive and they have needs. The robots will not communicate at all. They only carry out their programming. It’s unfortunate if seniors living in institutions are stuck with robots for company but let’s not delude ourselves about what is happening.

DeepSight:


https://mindmatters.ai/2021/02/can-robots-be-engineered-to-actually-feel-pain/

diridiri:


I know I wasn't the one being recommended the article, but I'm not particularly convinced by it.
I'll just place in some excerpts and write my thoughts on them.



I agree, mostly. Disagreements on what a "self" is notwithstanding, this seems factually correct.
What is quite puzzling, however, is the article's constant assertions that seems to suggest that a robot cannot have a subjective consciousness. Just because no known way exists to accomplish a task does not suggest that no way exists. It is only indicative of our current ignorance on the subject.



This is a pretty bold claim to make, considering that there is no scientific consensus as to where the "self" arises from. It makes the assertion that the self can not be generated by programming, even though there is no good reason to make this assumption. It also fails to entertain the possibility that animals are "programmed" by their nervous systems. A self-teaching robot is not programmed to execute the task required. It is programmed to be able to learn how to execute said task. This is, although heavily simplified, how deep learning works.



Yet another unfounded claim.
What is the difference between experiencing a sensation and obeying commands from the central nervous system?
And why the use of the word "obey"? Would you say your eye "obeys" commands from your brain? It might be slightly accurate, but it is definitely charged wording.

I love the little blurb that comes after this: "The paper requires a subscription". What does that have to do with anything? It's so out of place.



Admit? Admit what?
Whether this article likes it or not, nothing it itself proposes has been proven without a shadow of a doubt. There is nothing that even slightly indicates that only living beings can feel pain, unless you consider current lack of understanding a valid basis for completely discarding a line of inquiry. By this logic, people who claimed that propelled flight was impossible were not just speaking from a place of ignorance but objectively correct.



Yet another baseless insinuation that communication is somehow distinct from "...carrying out [one's] programming" .

Anyway, I read another one of its articles, one which the article you forwarded linked to. You can read it here: https://mindmatters.ai/2019/03/the-real-reason-why-only-human-beings-speak/

I don't plan on analyzing this article to as much detail as I did the previous, but its last paragraph is quite telling. It's amazing how people who peddle these theories never apply as much scrutiny to their own views as they do to "debunking" those of others. I doubt you'll be finding any proof of the "immaterial power" that they speak of any time soon, but that seems to be a nonissue. I wonder why.

DeepSight:


Wholly disagree, but I sense that this might be a six vs nine argument in terms of perspective and thus impossible to resolve.
Thanks nevertheless, for your time.

diridiri:


I don't really see anything that I said that was an issue of interpretation or perspective. Most of my issues with the article were not on opinionated grounds but with the factually incorrect, deceptive, and unfounded claims it constantly made.

Same to you, though. I don't wish to keep you here any longer than you would prefer to be.

DeepSight:


Its an entire way of viewing reality that I refer to as an issue of sixes and nines. That's what I sense is so fundamentally different here that it may be impossible to ever reconcile our views. Its hard to describe, but I think virtually everything you have said is fundamentally flawed and wrong (and I understand you think similarly of what I have said).

The reason I have to leave it is I can see no way of conveying my view you. If I think of something that could illuminate my view for you, I would be sure to raise it here. But I sincerely doubt that it is possible as our worldviews are too diametrically opposed. I will hope though, that you come across some thoughts in your own ruminations, which may show just how fundamentally flawed the idea that machines could experience pain is. Mind you, this extends to all other subjective experiences too. I dont believe this is a matter of the ordinary advancement of science and I believe it goes to the root of the nature of reality and consciousness. Alas, I will have to leave it at that.

Cheers, you have been a sport.

LordReed:


What is most important here is your insistence that we are wrong and you are right. I think that is what has driven some of your more combative responses. It's instructive that while you think we are wrong you are yet to present any concrete way to show that you are correct and we are wrong.

budaatum:
If its not ill-intended then perhaps reign it in somewhat with conscious intention.