Consciousness arising on the Internet

[whatitdo]

I recently read Robert J Sawyer's WWW trilogy(Wake, Watch, And Wonder), which is about the Internet becoming sentient, among other things. It made me wonder, could that happen? How? What would the intelligence be like? Would humanity try to kill it regardless? Let me know your thoughts, I'd like to hear what you think! Personally, I think it's possible, but I don't really know how it would happen...

P.S. For those who have read the books, do you think it could happen in the way described?

[d4rkcat]

I think the internet is the neural network of the human consciousness.
Not an intelligence per say, but rather a link that can strengthen global human awareness and unity.
It's like the mycelium of humans.
Trippy man. 
So I voted no, because I don't believe there can be any intelligence outside of biological life, only what we create, which will only do what we teach it to.

[whatitdo]

Interesting idea man, think about this: if its a neural network of the human consciousness, and getting stronger, will humanity eventually become a gigantic hivemind, with each person as a node? o.0

[d4rkcat]

Interesting idea man, think about this: if its a neural network of the human consciousness, and getting stronger, will humanity eventually become a gigantic hivemind, with each person as a node? o.0

What I speculate that the future looks like for humans and their technology:

The computers will be interfaced with our brain via implants.
We will be nodes on this internet as you say and all humans will become telepathic due to this.
We will be able to access any/all of the collective human knowledge using this system, and all new discoveries/theories that people have will be uploaded to the hivemind for others to benefit from/examine.
Money and wealth disparity will cease to exist.
People will not be able to lie about anything and there will be no more secrets.
The internet will be classified a natural human right / utility, and every person on the planet will have unmetered unlimited access to it.
Hunger, poverty and disease will be eradicated due to the exponential growth in the sciences that this system will allow for.
We will travel interstellar space and visit the other civilizations and finally become acquainted with the galactic community.

That's my dream anyway.
One can hope right?

[whatitdo]

What I speculate that the future looks like for humans and their technology:

The computers will be interfaced with our brain via implants.
We will be nodes on this internet as you say and all humans will become telepathic due to this.
We will be able to access any/all of the collective human knowledge using this system, and all new discoveries/theories that people have will be uploaded to the hivemind for others to benefit from/examine.
Money and wealth disparity will cease to exist.
People will not be able to lie about anything and there will be no more secrets.
The internet will be classified a natural human right / utility, and every person on the planet will have unmetered unlimited access to it.
Hunger, poverty and disease will be eradicated due to the exponential growth in the sciences that this system will allow for.
We will travel interstellar space and visit the other civilizations and finally become acquainted with the galactic community.

That's my dream anyway.
One can hope right?

Indeed, also, that scenario kinda reminds me of the world of William Gibson's Neuromancer

[cyberdrifter]

I recently read Robert J Sawyer's WWW trilogy(Wake, Watch, And Wonder), which is about the Internet becoming sentient, among other things. It made me wonder, could that happen? How? What would the intelligence be like? Would humanity try to kill it regardless? Let me know your thoughts, I'd like to hear what you think! Personally, I think it's possible, but I don't really know how it would happen...

P.S. For those who have read the books, do you think it could happen in the way described?

The internet... no... it won't one day spontaneously come to life. But there are already AI initiatives that are pulling data from the internet to feed their creations.


The internet itself is just a network of nodes that may or may not distribute data. It cannot become sentient. However there is potential for certain nodes on the net to become sentient.

[Architect]

There is speculation that under all of the systems on the planet, certain "nodes" in the internet are capable of siphoning power and knowledge. Such a thing could exist. That would be true artificial intelligence. However, it would not be possible for it to be sentient.

[cyberdrifter]

There is speculation that under all of the systems on the planet, certain "nodes" in the internet are capable of siphoning power and knowledge. Such a thing could exist. That would be true artificial intelligence. However, it would not be possible for it to be sentient.

There are already examples of computers that are "learning" from the internet, google's neural network is one example. With moores law in effect, the exponential growth of technological advancement. Pushes toward "uploading" a human mind, I think it is foolish to deny the fact that one day, if allowed to evolve to that point, systems will become self aware.


This is literally just a matter of time...

[Architect]

Whatever movies you're watching - you can put away your tinfoil hats. In fact, something like "Transcendence" is not going to happen in a very very long time. Possibly longer than that.

[cyberdrifter]

Whatever movies you're watching - you can put away your tinfoil hats. In fact, something like "Transcendence" is not going to happen in a very very long time. Possibly longer than that.

"a very very long time. possibly longer than that." Cool argument bro. In any case you are agreeing with what I said. It is a matter of time.


And the time it takes may be much shorter than what you and I could even begin to grasp if AI does reach the level that certain individuals (ray kurzweil comes to mind) predict. If you took just a moment and realize how quickly our technology has evolved...


Back in the 60s (first manned space flight) the computing technology that put a man on the moon wasn't a 100th as good as simple calculators we have today. Technology has BOOOMED Since our lifetime. It's not at all unreasonable to imagine such an AI existing within your childs lifetime. Infact it's anticipated to exist (by many experts) by 2045.

[zenith]

It's not at all unreasonable to imagine such an AI existing within your childs lifetime. Infact it's anticipated to exist (by many experts) by 2045.

Some estimates are as early as 2030. I remember reading about this sort of thing on here recently; the technological singularity. Very interesting stuff/theories. I ended up going on a wikipedia spree as a result of it.

[Architect]

Too many terminator movies, "bro".

[cyberdrifter]

Too many terminator movies, "bro".

Meet Ray Kurzweil bro,



In 2012 this goofy looking SOB, was appointed as director of Engineering at Google (You know what that is right? The search engine and advertising company.) heading up a team developing machine intelligence and natural language understanding.

Google as I'm sure you know has acquired Deep Mind
http://deepmind.com/
Which is a neural network capable of learning. How do they plan on achieving that you ask? Well they're going to write algorithms that can rewrite themselves... Yes Machines that can reprogram themselves... Nothing can go wrong there right? Except for that whole concept of us programming them to do what we want them to do ofcourse...

Anyway this guy Ray, he also wrote a book "The Age of Spiritual Machines" where he talks about the "law of accelerating returns" What's that you ask? Well it parallels moor's law (You know how many tranistors we can squeeze blah blah) except it's more general in that. We build tools that allow us to build better tools. This theory has allowed Ray here to predict with very close precision the evolution of technology.

You see technological evolution follows an exponential path (not linear like your perception of time) that is to say that it doubles you know kinda like binary 0,1,2,4,8,16,32,64,128,256,512,1024.... and not 0,1,2,3

Your small mind is incapable of seeing these leaps because you just can't see the pattern yet... But give it time... and when we get there, you'll be singing a different tune.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oe7hG1NXVdw

http://www.businessinsider.com/ray-kurzweil-thinks-well-have-human-level-ai-by-2029-2014-12
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vP-optO-7OE
http://www.inquisitr.com/1805304/ray-kurzweil-predicts-some-fantastic-things-coming-in-the-next-25-years/

[Architect]

@cyberdrifter Please don't condescend, it makes you look small. You're literally just stating the obvious and assuming that theory implies fact.

[cyberdrifter]

@cyberdrifter Please don't condescend, it makes you look small. You're literally just stating the obvious and assuming that theory implies fact.

Sorry if it seemed like I was being condescending. I just wasn't sure if I was speaking simply enough for you to understand. And those things might not be obvious to you, because if they were, then reaching my conclusion shouldn't have been that difficult/silly for you.