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ChristianKl comments on AI origin question - Less Wrong Discussion

1 Post author: hairyfigment 01 November 2015 08:35PM

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Comment author: ChristianKl 03 November 2015 02:32:41PM 0 points [-]

Direct brain to brain communication

What does "direct" mean? Synapses are linked through a wire?

Comment author: [deleted] 03 November 2015 04:38:32PM 0 points [-]

I have no science, only science fiction, ideas of how it could be done. What I am thinking of are two or more people who are communicating without speech, writing, gesture, eye contact, or in other conventional ways. Instead, a thought in one person's body is shared / perceived in another person's body. I think of a red fire truck and either you know I'm thinking of a red fire truck or you also think of a red fire truck, by some human-created non-conventional way. I can only guess it would be partially direct wiring between brains, partially sensors that detect and transmit / reproduce chemical and electrical changes in brains. I know some small amount of brain monitoring and brain wiring is possible now, but I make no claim a full brain to brain dialogue can ever happen. I'd like it to, maybe it will, I do not claim to know.

Comment author: ChristianKl 03 November 2015 04:44:15PM 0 points [-]

If there a machine that determine that a person thinks of a red fire truck and then stimulates the neurons in the brain of another person, that's not direct. The machine is in the middle.

The machine needs an internal language in which it can model "red fire truck", be able to recognize that in Alice by looking at neuron firing pattern and then have a model of what neuron firing would likely to have the effect of something like a "red fire truck" be perceived by another person.

Given those translation issues of those two changes of represenation systems I don't see why I would call the process "direct".

Comment author: CellBioGuy 03 November 2015 08:37:06PM 0 points [-]

To be fair you could also imagine a setup without such internal interpretation, with just signal X in electrode 1 causing signal X to be disgorged in electrode 2. It would then be up to the brains on either end to learn how to modulate/interpret this new channel. People can and do learn to use such new channels all the time whenever they are provided.

Comment author: ChristianKl 03 November 2015 09:07:49PM 0 points [-]

It would then be up to the brains on either end to learn how to modulate/interpret this new channel.

I think that's still substantially about learning a new language in which to communicate and not just transmitting existing thoughts as is.

Comment author: [deleted] 03 November 2015 07:24:30PM 0 points [-]

I want trying if failing to convey some realization of 'two heads are better than one.' Not an AI in the interfacing machine, but a consciousness that is neither of the two people connected. A self-awareness not found in either of the two connected people. It's not Alice and it's not Bob but is partially in Alice, partially in Bob and perhaps partially in their connection. The way two sounds with just the right frequency can produce a third sound when they overlap.