What do you think about Eugenics?

[Pyrrho]

You should look online for "machine learning" and you will see that machines can meet your requirements, at least insofar as you have explained them.

[The Grand Nudger]

It cannot rewrite its OS or subroutines. The brain is always 'rewriting' itself based on the neural connections and collected memories.

Of course a computer can rewrite it's OS.  What do you think it's doing when you go from Linux to Windows.....?  Computers -work- by constantly "rewriting" themselves based upon -their- inputs.....that's how the computing actually happens.

I'm not arguing, btw, that AI doesn't need to be able to do this. Just that it's got to be more than the ability to do this. I think we both feel like AI would have to be able to do -whatever it is- our minds are doing (though obvs not -everything- our mind is doing).

Leverage their process to a similar -effect-. Check this chip out, btw.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TrueNorth

[paulpablo]

Hopefully we make AI first and evolve using that path. 

Can anybody say "HAL" or "SkyNet" or "Cylon"?  

Or Cabal, the guy on my avatar.

[paulpablo]

I was thinking that according to evolution eugenics might not be a wrong thing to do but I've always been against it,i think that every human is unique and has his own place in this world so its a wrong practice

The following paragraphs are based on what I basically think is meant by eugenics, selective breeding imposed on people.  Like saying, even if you want to breed with a certain person you can't, or even if you yourself want to breed you can't, or having forced breeding.  Natural selection is individuals following their own choices and instincts whereas eugenics is like a synthetic version of this.

Basically I think some forms of eugenics are definitely right. People being prevented from having sex with close family relations, people with disabilities that are likely to be inherited into the next generation, maybe people who are over a certain age or under a certain age.)

Some forms of eugenics are debatable.  Economic eugenics, allowing poor people to have 15 children even though they know full well that each of those children will be paid for by benefits and hand outs.  But then I think it's wrong to tell people they're too poor to breed, and some people on benefits have worked very hard in their life only it was in a unsustainable industry, they might just be unlucky and there's so many things to consider.

Some eugenics I would say is definitely wrong like forced breeding humans for traits preferable for slaves, sterilization of people based on race and things like that.

Additionally the thing about nature vs human selection is that nature has already been selecting and improving life for millions of years, there are lots of instances of humans making decisions on improving their own bodies based on desirable traits and them not turning out well.  There's often a knock on effect of having too much of what may be considered to be a desirable trait that people don't take into consideration.

[Dystopia]

The thing about eugenics is that the argument that justifies lighter forms of it is the same to justify heavier forms - Like compulsory sterilization. The question people need to ask themselves is "Do I want a government that intervenes frequently with my life, intimacy and controls some of my fundamental rights?". Only by answering yes can you support eugenics.

Sterilization based on race is just wrong - I don't know about you guys, but in my country ethnic minorities (non-whites) have lots of children and less money - Guess who would be sterilized first? Right.

[The Grand Nudger]

The urge that sparks eugenics  is unlikely to take the form of a -breeding- program, in its next iteration, or be controlled by the government.  It will be genetic modification for profit, probably first before birth, and then, when and if the tech will allow, later in life.  There is a very real possibility that the difference between the haves and the have not's will one day become a palpable, physical difference.  Because you know that shit wont be cheap.....

[IATIA]

It cannot rewrite its OS or subroutines. The brain is always 'rewriting' itself based on the neural connections and collected memories.

Of course a computer can rewrite it's OS.  What do you think it's doing when you go from Linux to Windows.....?  Computers -work- by constantly "rewriting" themselves based upon -their- inputs.....that's how the computing actually happens.

When one changes operating systems, it is not the computer rewriting itself.
And when they are rewriting, it is the data they are rewriting.

[The Grand Nudger]

You're not the one doing the rewriting, are you?  Do you even know how...do you even understand what's happening? No, you clearly do not. So yeah...the computer is the one doing the work...and it's silly to say otherwise. May as well say that -you- aren;t doing your own "brainwork"...it's your environment and inputs. That's all you are to a computer, Iatia, an input. It doesn't actually require -you- to be the one pressing the buttons, or any other human being. Very often computers -are- the ones pressing the buttons for computers....but it could just as easly be a clock telling it to rewrite it's OS(and guess what a scheduled full wipe -is-)....or the position of the sun in the sky as relayed by a photoreceptor.

Computers -are- data, they are information -machines-.....assumptions made material....math made metal...dude....