1. Hello Harish,
2.  
3. I'm going to be extremely harsh now, because that's the easiest way for
4. me to communicate my reaction to what you write here. If you find
5. disrespect or impertinence in my writing, please know that I apologize
6. in advance. I do not write to attack you, but perhaps to attack certain
7. ideas you have expressed which I see as fallacious, and I do so lacking
8. better linguistic strategies. If you were pointing in a different
9. direction, I apologize; hopefully the remainder of my drunken rant has
10. some value greater than that of your time reading it.
11.  
12. -- extreme harshness begins --:
13.  
14. You say "we can't program consciousness". Sorry, but that statement is
15. False Bullshit Ignorance with a capital "FBI". It's completely fucking
16. wrong, and the evidence of that  is all around you.
17.  
18. Look, honestly, at what programs the most advanced "I"s we know today
19. (that's an "I" separated from "AI", which some people think is an
20. important disctinction) use to UTTERLY DOMINATE the consciousnesses of
21. their children, successors, heirs, fans, et cetera. Look, honestly, at
22. how much bullshit is fed to children, successors, heirs, fans and so on
23. in the form of superstitions, religions, national identities (David
24. Brin, you're looking sadly like a nationalist douche at the moment,
25. badly in need of an Uplift), race, tradition, tribe, family and so on.
26. We, the older people, whether by accident or design, systematically and,
27. largely without consideration, program, mercilessly and without regard
28. to truth, those unto whom we can communicate and over whom we can
29. exercise influence (and, preferably, dominance -- we are, after all,
30. filthy monkey shit-slinging jerks).
31.  
32. Each and every one of us programs consciousness every day, to one degree
33. or another. Hard introverts may program only themselves, but that
34. doesn't invalidate the statement. Strident extroverts program many, and
35. most of the time it doesn't matter what their message is or what mode of
36. comprehending reality they are attempting to empart, because far too few
37. humans are capable of a sound intellectual self-defense and critical
38. evaluation of the statements and exhortations of those around them.
39. Billions of people actually believe complete the nonsense that they see
40. on TV, the ridiculous bullshit they got told by some "holy" man was
41. written down in a 7000-year-old book, the risible self-serving horseshit
42. some modern holy man who looks good on TV and who writes down things in
43. law books as if his words created truth, and on and fucking on, and the
44. cowardly pigshit, rabbitshit, parakeetshit and chihuahuashit blabberings
45. of their dependents and hangers-on.
46.  
47. THOSE PEOPLE SUFFER BAD FILTERS. Interpreting reality is fucking hard.
48. There is a lot of signal, shit-tons of noise, and we have to deal with
49. our own hormonal responses right down to the level of skin-on-skin
50. between lovers in order to develop consistent views of the world that we
51. can proudly present to others as at least perhaps of better clarity than
52. those they currently hold.
53.  
54. Now, it seems, you'd like to speak about "artificial" "intelligence". I
55. put both words in scare quotes for concrete reasons. Let's trot off to
56. Mister Rogers' Neighborhood and break those down, shall we?
57.  
58. First, MAXIMUM BRUTALITY: There is no such thing as "artificial
59. intelligence", and there never will be. Why? Because the word
60. "artificial", to most people, denotes or connotes something not
61. belonging to nature. It turns out that a lot of people have a very
62. deeply-held view about things "natural" versus "artificial". (An
63. "ANYTHINGartifical sweetener" might be immediately suspected of causing
64. cancer, while a "natural sweetener" is given a pass -- it's a pity that
65. so few people understand chemistry and physics.).
66.  
67. THERE IS NO SUCH DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SOMETHING LABELED "ARTIFICIAL" AND
68. SOMETHING LABELED "NATURAL". Well, I mean, if you're talking about
69. something like a prospective intrusion of another m-brane upon the
70. reality we already suffer, that may be, but probably 98% of people or
71. more go around thinking things about "artifical flavor" or "natural
72. healing" or "artificial intelligence" or "natu...
73.  
74. ---- MESSAGE INTERRUPTED. WAIT PLACIDLY FOR OMEGA CONTINGENCY PLAN TIME
75. CODE ----
76.  
77. .....
78. ...
79. +++ATH0
80. ATDT14076463131
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87.  
88. PS: Along with the "A" in "A"I, the "I" should be in bogoquotes, too, as
89. "A""I". This goes to the idea that in fact there is no evidence that any
90. intelligence exists (Decartes was a wanker), and that there is no
91. evidence that even if as few as one such intelligence exists that it is
92. deserving of moral consideration.