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hi folks

The responses are so interesting and varied but none of these has yet to take the leap into what this means for the teaching of "wisdom".

Starting with the Artificial Moral Agent or AMA's, the book, Moral Machines suggests that to create fully AMA's whether from silicon, or the evolving molecular machines (approaching the organic?), they must have three distinct elements: consciousness, intentionality and free will. from a philosophical perspective one needs to address both the ontological and the epistemological both for these elements and then the idea of "wisdom".

That also means that we need to address these for humans since we are fast approaching a point where, as in Huxley's Brave New World, life can be (re)created in a jar or a vat with capacity for "thinking" not dependent on silicon bits and bytes. And the situation becomes even more complex since we can now hardwire silicon to the human brain for more than simple motor skill functions. We are approaching both "cyborgs" or the extroprian vision of "downloading" the human brain functions into an artificial "device".

Smart money says that "teaching" in the sense of having students "sit at the feet of a master" in its varied forms may be over-ridden by experential education, not just "on planet" or brick space but in virtual worlds of experience which may not be bounded by a fixed set of rules as in "computer games" of today but also be dynamic, affected by the "game play" of who is present when and where.

If we go back to some of the comments posted on this thread it is clear that there is far from a consensus even on humans from conception to death. It is not clear to me that new borns enter this world as "wise" as Cheri suggests. And Harvey's quoting of Mead seems to suggest that they may not be. Also as our silicon partners in medicine, for example, are showing, these chips in a box monitoring patients may suggest paths of treatment, including "pulling the plug" which even experts may be hard pressed to choose otherwise. so even at the upper right hand of the graph (only two dimensions here where the 3rd or high dimensions might be suggested) there is or soon will be the path which humans may not have seen or chosen, not necessarily evil as suggested in Kubric's 2001

What the science/philosophy surrounding the creation of AMA's raise are the fundamental epistemological and ontological issues which need to be addressed anew. Education is a lagging indicator in that it transmits what is known. That is why academics focus on "knowledge" because it is hard to test a person's mastery of materials that don't exist. If we are moving to a Dewey type process or problem-soliving, experential base, then we are fundamentally transforming education, as many suggest is happening. That means that "teaching" or instruction" either are eliminated or fundamentally changed and the "sage, don, or professor" are no longer.

best

tom

tom abeles

Date: Wed, 2 Sep 2009 11:14:10 +1000
From: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: artiificial moral agents (AMA)
To: [log in to unmask]

Dear Alan,

 

Such a demonstrative gesture that articulates so sacredly  the latter part of my brief input to  the debate.  Thank you. 

 

The more I observe  young children ‘observing’ their environments, experiencing the sensations,  vibrations, tone, timbre, pitch, impressions, feel, and  the  ambiance of their living moments and  then communicating to themselves their awareness’ or the understandings they have formed about these, their living moments, their shaping of their reality I am truly amazed.  Sometimes and especially when the child I observe appears to be deliberating long over the experience of what they are engaging with,    I long to have the capacity to understand that communication that they silently or vocally articulate to themselves. But my memory of that communication is lost to  me the adult and I can only surmise.  Often the ‘wisdom’ that is -  the experience and knowledge together with my erudite  judgement, fools me into supposing that I can interpret this child’s experience for them.  And then I am left feeling bereft because I know I can only express my own understanding of what I observe.  It is my interpretation of what I observe about the experience, it is not the knowledge that is laying the foundations of the wisdom of this child I see.  

 

 Food for thought has come to me from yourself, Ian and Yunus and I am deeply humbled.  Thank you again.

 

Cheri       

 

From: Alan Rayner (BU) [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Tuesday, 1 September 2009 04:47 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: artiificial moral agents (AMA)

 

Dear Cheri,

 

I do agree with you!

 

For reasons that may be evident in the attached.

 

Warmest

 

Alan

 

----- Original Message -----

From: [log in to unmask]">Cheri Yavu-Kama-Harathunian

To: [log in to unmask]">[log in to unmask]

Sent: Tuesday, September 01, 2009 3:25 AM

Subject: Re: artiificial moral agents (AMA)

 

Dear Tom,

 

What an interesting query.  

 

In my culture the teaching of my educators (from childhood to this present time where I am still learning our cultural practices and our Law/lore) well, they gave me the understanding that a just born child  carries with them awareness’s that are actually high in the upper right hand corner. There is this ‘just born’ awareness of the world around them that we adults have become so familiar with yet our first brush with our existence is for many adults,  but a dim memory.  The ‘intuitive’ awareness’s of a just born child are far more finely tuned than  we adults acknowledge.  And possible answers to this query will more than likely depend upon the perspective one takes, does one respond from the physical, the scientific, the spiritual, the behavioural/cognitive? 

 

A person is stimulated by external and internal awareness’s, by that which is seen and that which is not seen as long as they have life.  Isn’t that an aspect of my development, my education? As we live we learn, we acquire greater awareness’s of what is, how we are placed in the space of ‘what is’.  And this occurs by actually participating in life itself. 

 

Just recently I was arrested in my knowledgeable ‘self’  by the face of a week old child.  Shrewd, penetrating eyes – eyes that seemed to look all the way through me – the lenses of the new born’s mind  photographing not just my outer shell – my body- but my very character, my intentions, the person that very often other adults will only catch glimpses of if they choose to actually ‘look’.  Those new born child’s eyes  told me that an amazing mind was at work experiencing imprints and impressions,  seeking knowledge, laying down perceptions on this child’s schemata.  One day this child’s mind would mature and I hoped that in some way our meeting would help both of us develop the wisdom that I believe we are all privileged to seek as long as we live.  Can a robot do that?

 

Cheri Yavu-Kama-Harathunian

Coordinator

Nulloo Yumbah Learning Spirituality and Research Centre

CQUniversity

Bundaberg Queensland

Australia

Phone: 07 – 41507091

Email: [log in to unmask]      

 

From: tom abeles [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Tuesday, 1 September 2009 10:51 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: artiificial moral agents (AMA)

 

Greetings

There is a new book out:

Wallach, Wendell, and Colin Allen, Moral Machines: Teaching Robots Right from Wrong, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009

If one creates a two dimensional graph           high



                                       AUTONOMY

                                                                 |
                                                                 |
                                                                 |
                                                             low|
                                                                 |
                                                                 |
                                                                 |-----------------------------------------------
                                                                  low                                                       high

                                                                           ETHICAL sENSITIVITY
One can plot the capabilities of today's bots on this graph. So the question which I ask is, whether or not one believes that robots can achieve "consciousness" however defined, can robots achieve "wisdom". Or how do you address teaching or giving these bots wisdom? We can start with Asimov's flawed "3 laws" and start to realize that for even simple robots in existence today, some decisions have moral consequences.

A more interesting question should be when does a just born child which exists in the lower left arrive at a place in the upper right hand corner, if ever and how do we know when such has been achieved.

tom

tom abeles

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