Are the Androids Dreaming Yet? Amazing Brain Human Communication Creativity Free Will James Tagg 9781910464038 Books
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How Alan Turing invented the computer, helped win world war II and left us with one of the greatest puzzles of our time are humans simply computers or are we more than that? Many scientists think we have a tenuous hold on the title, “most intelligent being on the planet”. They think it’s just a matter of time before computers become smarter than us, and then what? This book charts a journey through the science of information, from the origins of language and logic, to the frontiers of modern physics. From Lewis Carroll’s logic puzzles, through Alan Turing and his work on Enigma and the imitation game, to John Bell’s inequality, and finally the Conway-Kochen ‘Free Will’ Theorem. How do the laws of physics give us our creativity, our rich experience of communication and, especially, our free will?
Are the Androids Dreaming Yet? Amazing Brain Human Communication Creativity Free Will James Tagg 9781910464038 Books
This review originally appeared on my blog at www.gimmethatbook.com.ARE THE ANDROIDS DREAMING YET? attempts to introduce the lay reader to the landscape of issues surrounding human intelligence and its congruence, or lack thereof, with human intelligence. The author makes an earnest attempt to achieve his goal, and a layperson’s understanding of topics ranging from probability theory to quantum electrodynamics. The tone is light, and each topic is rounded out in just one short chapter. Each chapter concludes with an explanation of how its contents pertain to the way we perceive the relationship between human and machine intelligence. For those who are uninitiated to these topics, the explanations suffice. Such a reader will come out of these segments feeling that they have come to understand something that had previously been far over their heads.
While it is a great thing to bring understanding of complex topics to a lay readership, the unavoidable problem is that the shallowness of the introductions to these topics does not give the reader the tools necessary to follow the author from premise to conclusion. The worst that this problem brings to bear is that the book does not sufficiently address the fact that the conclusions presented are highly contentious in the eyes of professionals in their respective fields. For each mathematical and scientific alcove the author guides the reader through, he seems always to present the conclusion that points most strongly toward human cognition being non-computable. I get the feeling that the author decided before putting pen to paper that he wanted to show that human minds really are special, and then set out to find examples to support him. Nothing in this book indicates that he did the scientifically honest thing: looking at the literature first, and going from there. It doesn’t matter how fringe or mainstream the theory is. If that theory can be twisted to put human beings back in the center of the universe, then you can learn about it by reading this book!
If you’ve read any of my previous reviews, you’ll know that I’m a big believer in the importance of recognizing future AIs as having rights and being deserving of respect, just as any flesh-and-bones creature capable of love, fear, pain, and pleasure is. At the end of the last chapter, the author suggests that we shouldn’t worry about such things since, in 100 years, we probably still won’t be able to fashion an AI. I believe that this sentiment betrays an awesome lack of understanding regarding the power of recursive/iterative development patterns. Humans will not create the first AI. The first AI will probably create itself by means understood by some several dozen people, each of which understand some fraction of the process by which it happened, none understanding it in full. Just as I cannot judge you by your neurobiology because the entirety of your neurobiology is beyond my capacity to comprehend, likewise, we cannot judge the fitness of an AI to deserve rights we reserve for humans because the basis of its being “alive” is not within the possibility of comprehension of any person. Therefore, we simply have to hand those rights over. We also need to have a conversation about AI rights very quickly. Such an intelligence is fast approaching, in spite of the author’s assurance that humans minds perform processes that are non-computable (nonsense!), and that we perform various mental functions that cannot be translated into algorithms and logical circuits (also nonsense).
My final assessment of ANDROIDS is that lay readers will enjoy the expositions of niche topics in science, math, physics, computer science, and philosophy very much, and there is plenty of food for thought here. I would, however, advise savvy readers to keep a keen eye out for fishy-smelling claims and overused superlatives. If something seems odd, Google it.
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Tags : Are the Androids Dreaming Yet?: Amazing Brain. Human Communication, Creativity & Free Will. [James Tagg] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. How Alan Turing invented the computer, helped win world war II and left us with one of the greatest puzzles of our time: are humans simply computers or are we more than that? Many scientists think we have a tenuous hold on the title,James Tagg,Are the Androids Dreaming Yet?: Amazing Brain. Human Communication, Creativity & Free Will.,Hurst Farm Books,1910464031,COMPUTERS Social Aspects Human-Computer Interaction
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Are the Androids Dreaming Yet? Amazing Brain Human Communication Creativity Free Will James Tagg 9781910464038 Books Reviews
This book had me enthralled from the very first chapter. I am grateful that I received a complimentary review copy because it is quite possible that I might never have discovered and read it otherwise. Its title contains the following additional phrase Human communication, creativity and free will. That is essentially what author James Tagg explores in this book but it hardly does justice to the vast number of topics upon which he touches. With a structure that reminds me somewhat of Douglas Hofstadter's masterwork Godel, Escher, Bach, Are the Androids Dreaming Yet? exuberantly fills its pages with an almost reckless abandon of compelling details.
In a kind-of mosaic of pertinent data, we are presented with fascinating facts, hard-science theory and conjectural hypothesis, a wealth of interesting stories, personal anecdotes and memories, practical and thoroughly impractical experiments, poetry, artworks, a brilliant litany of quotations, and a cast of characters from Einstein, Penrose and Turing to Poincare, Feynman and Franz Liszt. No simple description can do this book justice. What the author has done is to create a web of data that serves to illustrate his assertions and provide a powerful argument for his thesis that consciousness is not a computer analog with its pre-programmed logic and essential simplicity. Computer complexity is a function of its internal clock and computational speed. Human consciousness does not function this way. It contains constituents of thought such as memory, emotion, a grab-bag of logical inferences and intuition, imagery and language, and an element of quantum randomness that should not be minimized. Consciousness may ultimately be modeled or it may remain mysterious, but it cannot be reduced to simple variables the way a computer program ultimately can.
These random and mysterious aspects of consciousness may very well be the root of our persistent notions of free-will. Our creativity, which has re-shaped the world, seems unique to consciousness and is not somehow wired into the very fabric of the universe. My sense of the flow of arguments which the book presents in an extremely relaxed and general reader-friendly fashion (with little if any jargon of any kind), is that it points towards the utter uniqueness of human consciousness. A thinking machine that emulates consciousness, exhibits free will and is as creative as the human brain that envisioned and built it is probably not possible. We can use the Turing Test or Imitation Game to fool someone into thinking that a hidden computer is human but given time and a more rigorous test and the deception will ultimately be uncovered. We are only at the beginning of the age of artificial intelligence. There is no way to tell what the future holds. Are the Androids Dreaming Yet? with its title evoking Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is the most readable analysis of these profound questions I've yet encountered. It is most strongly recommended.
Intriguing stuff on the state of the art, but the book refers to missing links at the author's website. Even so, the book is informative and thought provoking.
The author poses a number of questions in his popular science rendition of artificial intelligence, robotics, androids and a philosophical-theological quandary regarding free will. Can we calculate ad infinitum mathematical models to resolve our problem? Is the universe like a clockwork mechanism or are photons mysteriously at work? Are androids capable of creative decision making in the thrust to develop them to imitate human behavior? The book is full of illustrations, historical experiments, puzzles and a bit daunting for the average reader but rewarding nonetheless.
Although I was provided an electronic copy I purchased my own paperback for this review.
A very thought provoking book. I liked the book so much, I bought a copy for my son (both versions). I spent 36 years configuring and installing supercomputers in DoD labs and military situations (from Polaris submarines to outer-space). Computers cannot hold a candle to the power of the human brain. When you consider that each neuron (brain cell) can make up to 10,000 connections to other neurons ... you've outclassed a computer which can only make a few connections between transistors. That is why you cannot compare "neuron-count" to "transistor-switch-count". The brain has 100 billion neurons. Multiply that by 10,000 connections. Then consider that the brain can rewire itself on the fly ... computers can only change their software program.
This review originally appeared on my blog at www.gimmethatbook.com.
ARE THE ANDROIDS DREAMING YET? attempts to introduce the lay reader to the landscape of issues surrounding human intelligence and its congruence, or lack thereof, with human intelligence. The author makes an earnest attempt to achieve his goal, and a layperson’s understanding of topics ranging from probability theory to quantum electrodynamics. The tone is light, and each topic is rounded out in just one short chapter. Each chapter concludes with an explanation of how its contents pertain to the way we perceive the relationship between human and machine intelligence. For those who are uninitiated to these topics, the explanations suffice. Such a reader will come out of these segments feeling that they have come to understand something that had previously been far over their heads.
While it is a great thing to bring understanding of complex topics to a lay readership, the unavoidable problem is that the shallowness of the introductions to these topics does not give the reader the tools necessary to follow the author from premise to conclusion. The worst that this problem brings to bear is that the book does not sufficiently address the fact that the conclusions presented are highly contentious in the eyes of professionals in their respective fields. For each mathematical and scientific alcove the author guides the reader through, he seems always to present the conclusion that points most strongly toward human cognition being non-computable. I get the feeling that the author decided before putting pen to paper that he wanted to show that human minds really are special, and then set out to find examples to support him. Nothing in this book indicates that he did the scientifically honest thing looking at the literature first, and going from there. It doesn’t matter how fringe or mainstream the theory is. If that theory can be twisted to put human beings back in the center of the universe, then you can learn about it by reading this book!
If you’ve read any of my previous reviews, you’ll know that I’m a big believer in the importance of recognizing future AIs as having rights and being deserving of respect, just as any flesh-and-bones creature capable of love, fear, pain, and pleasure is. At the end of the last chapter, the author suggests that we shouldn’t worry about such things since, in 100 years, we probably still won’t be able to fashion an AI. I believe that this sentiment betrays an awesome lack of understanding regarding the power of recursive/iterative development patterns. Humans will not create the first AI. The first AI will probably create itself by means understood by some several dozen people, each of which understand some fraction of the process by which it happened, none understanding it in full. Just as I cannot judge you by your neurobiology because the entirety of your neurobiology is beyond my capacity to comprehend, likewise, we cannot judge the fitness of an AI to deserve rights we reserve for humans because the basis of its being “alive” is not within the possibility of comprehension of any person. Therefore, we simply have to hand those rights over. We also need to have a conversation about AI rights very quickly. Such an intelligence is fast approaching, in spite of the author’s assurance that humans minds perform processes that are non-computable (nonsense!), and that we perform various mental functions that cannot be translated into algorithms and logical circuits (also nonsense).
My final assessment of ANDROIDS is that lay readers will enjoy the expositions of niche topics in science, math, physics, computer science, and philosophy very much, and there is plenty of food for thought here. I would, however, advise savvy readers to keep a keen eye out for fishy-smelling claims and overused superlatives. If something seems odd, Google it.
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