/ News

29.06.2012

I, not robot: A critic speaks out (while she still can)

Friday on Eight Forty-Eight: The Dueling Critics meet their new robotic overlords. 

When I heard that robots were writing sports stories, I was barely surprised: So many stories about competitive sports are a list of names and numbers (“Boston beat the White Sox 4-2, with pitcher Whoosafroogit’s wild pitch in the 4th inning leading to a walk-off homer by Whatsisname”). The data are simple, easily retrievable and easy to assemble into comprehensible sentences.

But robots writing criticism? The mind (at least mine) boggles. Are reviews really that formulaic? And if they are, is the response to give them to robots to write or to jolt human writers out of their complacency?

I don’t pretend to be current on the state of artificial intelligence, so when I say I don’t understand how a robot could write criticism, I mean that literally. Has robotics advanced to the point that a walking computer could take in a performance, compare it to a large body of other performances it has seen before and evaluate the worth of the script and the persuasiveness (dare I say “humanity”?) of the actors?

We assess quality based on a template consisting not only of our previous theatrical experiences but of our experiences of people in general, which is why a reviewer’s perspective changes over time. It’s not clear to me how that body of learning could be acquired, much less meaningfully processed, by a machine.

Then there’s the question of insight: An alert critic experiences each production of a play differently and, in the best cases, understands something about the play from Production Q that she’d never realized during Productions A through P. And there’s the question of tone: A human being can tell that Chekhov’s monologue about giving up tobacco is actually a revelation of existential despair. Could a robot understand that, or would it object to the constant divergences from the ostensible topic?

But all of these pale before the ultimate question: Do android critics dream of electric actors?

Deactivating now.

Source: http://www.wbez.org/blogs/onstagebackstage/2012-06/i-not-robot-critic-speaks-out-while-she-still-can-100470




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Founded by Russian entrepreneur Dmitry Itskov in February 2011 with the participation of leading Russian specialists in the field of neural interfaces, robotics, artificial organs and systems.

The main goals of the 2045 Initiative: the creation and realization of a new strategy for the development of humanity which meets global civilization challenges; the creation of optimale conditions promoting the spiritual enlightenment of humanity; and the realization of a new futuristic reality based on 5 principles: high spirituality, high culture, high ethics, high science and high technologies. 

The main science mega-project of the 2045 Initiative aims to create technologies enabling the transfer of a individual’s personality to a more advanced non-biological carrier, and extending life, including to the point of immortality. We devote particular attention to enabling the fullest possible dialogue between the world’s major spiritual traditions, science and society.

A large-scale transformation of humanity, comparable to some of the major spiritual and sci-tech revolutions in history, will require a new strategy. We believe this to be necessary to overcome existing crises, which threaten our planetary habitat and the continued existence of humanity as a species. With the 2045 Initiative, we hope to realize a new strategy for humanity's development, and in so doing, create a more productive, fulfilling, and satisfying future.

The "2045" team is working towards creating an international research center where leading scientists will be engaged in research and development in the fields of anthropomorphic robotics, living systems modeling and brain and consciousness modeling with the goal of transferring one’s individual consciousness to an artificial carrier and achieving cybernetic immortality.

An annual congress "The Global Future 2045" is organized by the Initiative to give platform for discussing mankind's evolutionary strategy based on technologies of cybernetic immortality as well as the possible impact of such technologies on global society, politics and economies of the future.

 

Future prospects of "2045" Initiative for society

2015-2020

The emergence and widespread use of affordable android "avatars" controlled by a "brain-computer" interface. Coupled with related technologies “avatars’ will give people a number of new features: ability to work in dangerous environments, perform rescue operations, travel in extreme situations etc.
Avatar components will be used in medicine for the rehabilitation of fully or partially disabled patients giving them prosthetic limbs or recover lost senses.

2020-2025

Creation of an autonomous life-support system for the human brain linked to a robot, ‘avatar’, will save people whose body is completely worn out or irreversibly damaged. Any patient with an intact brain will be able to return to a fully functioning  bodily life. Such technologies will  greatly enlarge  the possibility of hybrid bio-electronic devices, thus creating a new IT revolution and will make  all  kinds of superimpositions of electronic and biological systems possible.

2030-2035

Creation of a computer model of the brain and human consciousness  with the subsequent development of means to transfer individual consciousness  onto an artificial carrier. This development will profoundly change the world, it will not only give everyone the possibility of  cybernetic immortality but will also create a friendly artificial intelligence,  expand human capabilities  and provide opportunities for ordinary people to restore or modify their own brain multiple times.  The final result  at this stage can be a real revolution in the understanding of human nature that will completely change the human and technical prospects for humanity.

2045

This is the time when substance-independent minds will receive new bodies with capacities far exceeding those of ordinary humans. A new era for humanity will arrive!  Changes will occur in all spheres of human activity – energy generation, transportation, politics, medicine, psychology, sciences, and so on.

Today it is hard to imagine a future when bodies consisting of nanorobots  will become affordable  and capable of taking any form. It is also hard to imagine body holograms featuring controlled matter. One thing is clear however:  humanity, for the first time in its history, will make a fully managed evolutionary transition and eventually become a new species. Moreover,  prerequisites for a large-scale  expansion into outer space will be created as well.

 

Key elements of the project in the future

• International social movement
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