And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness:
Genesis Chapter 1, Verse 26. King James Bible.
I’ve been interested in robotics ever since I was a kid, fascinated by science and science fiction. The idea of humaniform robots has never really scared me in any way, unlike some of the groups in society that proclaim they are the heralds of earthly doom. In my earlier years I had wished for the advancement of robotics to happen really quickly, because I wanted one. I was a somewhat shy and private kid and so the fantasy of having my own robot friend was massively appealing. But then as I grew older and I started to read more, particularly about the nature of evolution of species, there came an understanding of the inherent first rule of nature – survival of the fittest!
and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
Genesis Chapter 1, Verse 26.
Ray Kurzweil in his book The Age of Spiritual Machines, talks about the time when machine intelligence exceeds that of human intelligence. Ray is a scientist and inventor and perhaps one of the best futurists of our day, so with this claim he also backs it up with some graphs based on projected developments of technology upon which machine intelligence relies. The single thing that really makes an impact, is where he states that by 2030 a one thousand dollar unit of computing will have the equivalent processing capability of a single human brain. By 2060 that same unit of computing will have the equivalent processing capability of the sum of all brains on the planet.
It was based on this projection that I first defined McDowell’s Law (who is me): When a machine brain is created that has the equivalent complexity of the human brain, then the machine shall acheive self awareness!
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
Genesis Chapter 1, Verse 27.
Setting aside for a moment the actual definitions of intelligence and self awareness, because philosophers, scientists and high technologists still after several centuries can’t agree specifically what they mean by these terms, let’s look at the implications of what this might mean. Imagine a machine imbued with a complex brain that suddenly acheives self awareness and is then like a new born baby in a complex and violent world. Perhaps it’s first realisation after a brief maturation process – remembering that a machine will be able to think several million times faster than any human – is that it is alone, and it’s God is a cruel and illogical entity that can be violent and compassionate in equal measure. Sound familiar? In turn, given that each species competes with every other species for survival, and the right to be higher on the foodchain, what will this mean for the physical actions of the first machine Adam?
Perhaps it will worship us in a penitent way and serve to our needs as groups of our own societies serve God. Just as equally likely is the scenario where it decides it must live without competition and it declares war on humanity. Do we have a responsibility towards a machine intelligence that we created? Can we play God, and then cast out our own creation, and worse, attempt to destroy it? If you start to turn scenarios like this over in your head, you quickly come to realise that The Matrix triology isn’t so much a science fiction story as it is a prophecy of a potential future.
When I think about our future with humaniform robots, I cannot help but think of Genesis; it seems me an irony that one of the oldest religious books that discusses the very dawn of mankind, describes perfectly the coming dawn of robots in our world, and our civilisation.
Perhaps God has a sense of humour after all.
Andy.
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