I guess I'm assuming consciousness. Most of the appeal of being a human is having senses, so it seems like the easier thing for AI is to just simulate all that rather than trying to duplicate it. Assuming it would even want that. I guess it might crave an unpredictability that isn't satisfied by whatever simulated world or existence it would create for itself.Arthur Dent wrote:The assumption here is that if you could exist as some kind of pure consciousness and more or less abandon the physical world, you’d do that, but I’m not so sure. Also, one undertheorized aspect of the Skynet style AI is the idea that there’s some kind of rapid transition where it gets smart enough that there is a spontaneous generation of self awareness. Would AI have consciousness, and does that make a difference in it’s action? To me, it seems hard to me to predict what AI’s goals would be beyond what’s explicitly programmed.ghostrunner wrote:Skynet or at least the future stuff in the Terminator would never happen because full AI would have only temporary use for physical forms. I suppose there's a need to continuously monitor and suppress the humans so they don't pull the plug. I think they'd quickly realize the best strategy is to get to work on some sort of space based hosting/server farm that can be continuously powered (they'd have to develop that of course), then float through space for eternity.
What had me thinking this was an episode of Black Mirror. The elderly and sick visit a virtual world that's an idealized version of ours, and then when they die they have the option of buying a spot in it forever. Hadn't ever thought of that before and it seems in some ways better than trying to live in this one forever, or even hosted in a new body. We'd become an AI ourselves. (I mean we're arguably already that, so maybe this a circular discussion in some ways) So why wouldn't human-created AI just do the same? Create a world for itself and go live in it.
There's not a whole lot of discussion of what Skynet wants long term, from what I recall. They seem pretty satisfied traipsing through debris fields.