THE DEVIL ON TRIAL proceeds at a slow but steady pace. Another excerpt, a conversation between the head of the project that created the artificial intelligence and Artie: # Mack leaned forward in his chair, gazing at the face in the screen. “How about it? Could you do that?” Of course. It’s not that much more difficult than the project assigned me before. Mark released a held breath, not quite a sigh, and leaned back, relieved. “What other projects are you working on?” Designing software. There’s an element of irony involved. “How so?” Admittedly, humor is idiocyncratic and subtle but I’ve been given an appreciation for irony. Also, admittedly, I do not react as you do. I don’t laugh but I can still observe the irony and appreciate it. This is necessary for me to create a drama. Dramas without wit or a frisson of humor tends to become tedious. Mark crossed his legs, made himself more comfortable in the chair. “What did you find ironic?” Actually, there are several elements of irony. As you know, most of what makes me different from other programs is software, so I suppose I could consider the software I’m creating my children. Also, I’ve noted a bias in most of the commercial software created by human programmers and have adjusted my approach to make the software more useful. In your jargon, “user-friendly.” I find it ironic that I, only software myself, can produce a program easier to use by human beings than a program created by a human programmer, but complicated by company policy. “What’s wrong with the programs we create?” You often attempt to write programs and manuals to impress other programmers or your superiors. When you actually produce something which can be utilized by those who are less computer-literate the companies quash it, as they’re trying to impress their clients. The end-user who has minimal computer literacy is at a total loss. Commands are almost never in plain English or other national language. It also tend to never use a single operation when three can be used. Mark rubbed his chin. “You might be onto something. We are all computer-literate, so we all speak a language of our own. The programs you’re creating might eventually be more important and profitable than the drama.” He cleared his throat, hesitated long enough to organize his thoughts. “Sam and I spoke yesterday of using your abilities for more than just the hard sciences. Do you think you could handle such soft sciences as economics, psychology, or even something like theology or philosophy?” Within limits. For example, in the area of psychology, I could deal with any questions that involved quantification, and I could be an excellent diagnostician, as most mental and emotional disturbances have detectable symptoms. In philosophy, science has already encroached upon metaphysics and epistemology while ethics is too imprecise and subjective to yield firm answers by human beings, much less an artificial intelligence. “Are you saying that the study of ethics is a waste of time?” Not at all. Many people find pleasure in engaging in many activities which have no objective worth. While there’s no intrinsic value to such preoccupations, there’s also no harm done. People are educated, imperfectly, by their cultures to understand the best way to behave in a given society. All the pages written on ethics merely attempt to codify or make eternal the relatively simple rules by which humans should live to avoid strife. Most of the tracts deal with exceptions and internal contradictions, trying to fit them into cohesive patterns. There are also cases in which the philosopher is being perverse and attempts to satisfy his prejudices by providing a systematic structure for them. “That’s pretty harsh. You make it sound as though philosophers are deluded or are deluding others about either their assumptions or the value of their work. Artie remained silent. Mark considered what he’d heard. “What contradictions are you talking about? One of the most basic is the value of human life. Most modern societies are ostensibly based on the belief that human life is intrinsically valuable, although few, if any, societies actually place a priority on life to an appreciable degree. Still, if you take human life as a value of the highest good, the society must punish those who take the lives of others. Since human life is the highest good, perhaps superseded by the value of the society as a whole, then the penalty for taking a human life should be most severe, but the life of a murderer also has intrinsic value. “And how would you decide?” I don’t. It’s not my decision to make.
Posted on: Sat, 19 Jul 2014 20:05:18 +0000