Howell - the need for machine consciousness
Howell - the need for machine consciousness
11May2023 Howell: This webPage is only just being drafted, with problems of finding old [reports, references]. It is not a core priority (related to the 3 questions of hte overview), so progress will be slow.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Grossberg 2021: cellular evolution and top-down-bottom-up mechanisms
see Grossberg 2021: the biological need for machine consciousness
Fear of the machines
Fears of the evil use, application] of LLMs and what is to come :
- no different than concerns expressed over the last 100 years or so in [philosophy, science, sci-fi]. includes high-profile [neural network, philosopy, policy, etc] experts, as well as many well-informed public.
- major intitiatives over the last decade or so
Those that seek to [suppress, control] Computational Intelligence well intentioned, but ...
Howell 2011: the need for machine consciousness
???
Other Howell material :
d_web='http://www.BillHowell.ca/'
(however, my directories and links are all messed up - might be misplaced)
"$d_web"'Neural nets/' :
Computational neuro-genetic modelling.html
Howell 150225 - MindCode Manifesto.odt
"$d_web"'References/Howell/' :
Howell 2005 - Presentation, Junk DNA and Neural Networks conjecture on directions and implications.ppt
Howell 2006 - Genetic specification of neural networks, draft concepts and implications.pdf
Howell 2006 - Presentation, Genetic Specification of Recurrent Neural Networks Initial Thoughts.ppt
Howell - Confabulation, A quick, fun survey of Plausible Next Sentences.odt
Howell 110824 - Confabulation Theory - Plausible next sentence survey.pdf
"$d_web"'ProjMajor/'
from "$d_web"'Neural nets/Howell 131013 Robots, Signal Processing and Control Theory - Random, stray thoughts.pdf' :
The following are reports that I did as part of a "Natural Resources Canada" (Canadian federal government department) project "?can't remember the full title for the acronym any more?" (SPINE).
Howell 2011 – Social graphs, social sets, and social media (63pp ~25% finished), http://www.gcpedia.gc.ca/gcwiki/images/9/90/Howell_2011_%E2%80%93_Social_graphs%2C_social_sets %2C_and_social_media.doc
Social graphs and social sets, including dynamics - Nothing has been done yet on this paper, which is far more challenging and advanced than any of the others. It does, however, tackle issues at the heart of the "new" social media (Facebook, Twitter like systems), as well as elaborating more advanced concepts (some of which have "placeholders" in the "Semantics beyond search" paper).
Howell 2011 – Semantics beyond search (version 110905 Howell, 30pp ~25-30% finished), http://www.gcpedia.gc.ca/gcwiki/images/a/a6/Howell_2011_%E2%80%93_Semantics_beyond_search.doc
The intent here is to force open everyone's thinking on the potential impacts and applications of semantics. (posted 06Sep2011, authored by Howell)
Howell 2011 - How to set up & use data mining with Social media.doc (15pp ~20% finished), http://www.gcpedia.gc.ca/gcwiki/images/c/ca/Howell_2011_-_How_to_set_up_ %26_use_data_mining_with_Social_media.doc
A very large and diverse set of data-mining tools and systems are available for a wide range of needs, and it is not the intent of this document to overview the toolsets for data-mining. Instead, several "under-the-hood" capabilities (HOW) are discussed as are WHAT we might be seeking to achieve with Data-mining and Social Media.
Howell 2011 – Systems design issues for social media (version 110902 Howell, 18pp ~20% finished) , http://www.gcpedia.gc.ca/gcwiki/images/c/c6/SPINE_ %E2%80%93_Systems_design_issues_for_social_media_110902_Howell.doc
Although a framework and a fair amount of comment has been produced for this paper, I do not have sufficient breadth to complete this on my own. However, I will be looking for others to either input or produce their own work, and I can raise a lot of issues and "provocations" that I hope to get others to respond to.
>> I can't find the original files...
Why is [sentience, conscience] NEEDED?
biological evolution
addressed by Grossberg - quote him
looking cell-level information processing precursors hinting at ART-like capabilities
microtubules - Roger Penrose's quantum consciousness
requirement for pre-conscious basic building blocks (Grossberg)
machine consciousness - see for example :
Howell 30Dec2011, page 39 "Part VI - Far beyond current toolsets"
Like intellectual maggots eating our way through layers of an onion, each breakthrough to the next layer reveals much larger and more complex challenges, and that we were further from out original goal than we seemed to be at the start!! That will certainly apply as a principle if breakthroughs occur as anticipated below.
- [Rational, logical, scientific] thinking - has already been described, along with its limitations,
- Semantics - brings you to what I would call a “lower-level” or “simple” Cognition, or more specifically, a “description” of Cognition.
- Artificial Intelligence (AI) - classical AI (à la godfather Marvin Minsky of MIT, and up to at least the 1990’s end of the Fifth Generation Computing initiative of Japan)
- Computational Intelligence (CI) (as discussed in Part II and IV, and in particular, connectionist systems) addresses higher-order [adapting, optimizing, competing] systems
- Sentient Intelligence (SI) - This is (for my usage!) a stolen term, in which I include:
- [conscious, self-aware, self-defining, goal-setting] systems;
- [attitudes, behaviours, personalities]; and
- [morals, cultures, religions] – to guide the previous concepts.
I don’t think that “Sentient” is the right term, nor that the short description of it that I have provided in the previous sentence is complete or consistent, nor that the [“conscious”, “attitudinal”, “moralistic”] attribute groups should be grouped together under the single title of “Sentient”. However, this is a start.
biological brain