Sunday, April 17, 2005

The robot catastrophe

Federal Appeals Court Judge Richard A. Posner has a new book out, Catastrophe: Risk and Response. One of the catastrophes he foresees (#7, in the “Scientific Accidents” category) is intelligent robots:

There may some day (decades, not centuries, hence), be robots with human and eventually (but decades, not centuries, later) more than human intelligence. It wasn’t long ago that people thought a chess machine could never beat a grand master. With improvements in voice- and face-recognition software, neuroscience, robotics, communications, digitization, and artificial intelligence, there are now robot soccer teams, albeit the players are only the size
of coffee cans and move on wheels. Of greater portent, electrodes planted in monkeys’ brains enable the animals to control robotic arms, connected by wire to the electrodes, by sheer thought. Similar electrodes in human brains, connected wirelessly to robots, would open up new vistas in warfare. The next step would be to replace the human brain with an equally intelligent robot’s brain.

Really? That’s the next step? I keep saying I’d rather port my brain over to a robot’s body, given that this one’s 50 and not nearly as spry as it once was. Or augment this body and keep the brain. Heck, after years of education, therapy and plain old hard-earned experience, I’ve pretty much got this brain to where I want it. I don’t think I’d want to replace it with a robot brain. But maybe…

Read the rest of "The robot catastrophe" in the extended entry.

Lego organ

Dr.Doug, in addition to his other activities, is a church organist and a fan of pipe organs. This Lego church organ is for him and his friends. I’m sure they’ll also enjoy the full Lego church photo gallery. You will too.

Via TexasBestGrok who loves legos and pipe organs.

Fashion activist

Doug just ordered two of these, one for him and one for his mother.

What about me?

“You can order one yourself. It’s easy. Go to AARP.org/socialsecurity."

But I’m trying to figure out how to convert .tivo files into .avi so I can put last night’s Saturday Night Live Tom Brady’s Falafel City skit on my blog.

I had never heard of Tom Brady before but he was such a great guest host that I’ve become a fan.