2007/12/18
>>What Does This Say About People?

The sole program on a computer has been told to determine the most appropriate, useful choice of three objects given a situation Q in which they are to be used, and return that answer. The program is then shown three objects X Y and Z, which for Q they are all of determinably equal use. Which object does the program pick?

To start off, the program would need to have been given a method of responding to these circumstances. That method of coping with identical quantifiers infers a preference, but it is the preference of the program's creator. At the root of every(?) computer language, there is an inherent preference for one of the objects depending on how the language creator told it to handle such a situation. If the program were written without one, the language it is written in will have something dictating which object is chosen, inferring the preference of the language creator.

Would a computer having preferences necessarily dictate personality? Given that the preferences were programmed into it by an outside creator, no. The computer isn't what is determining how it handles such a circumstance. The program or the language is doing that for it and directing which object is chosen. The preferences put in place are a sort of given personality.

Because pre-stated preferences exist, it follows that the program has been given a personality and not developed it on its own. It can display its static personality via its responses from being asked to choose between qualitatively equal objects, but it cannot alter the personality it has been given, and it is not using any outer reasoning capabilities to determine the preferences. It is a false personality.




I am Sawa.

Since your thinking has a direct bearing on your performance, your thinking must be based on sound input.

I listen. I watch. I write.
With no wings, with no things.