The design of a conscious machine.
Building a conscious machine is the ultimate frontier in the philosophical quest of self knowledge.
Almost as soon as the first computers were produced, researchers attempted to design and build intelligent machines. To do so, they defined a new field of technology, Artificial Intelligence. Initially, they expected to create intelligent machines within a few years.
However, the goal turned out to be much harder than anticipated. After some early success, progress ground to a halt. Eventually, the early attempts at implementing machines that would meet our intuitive understanding of intelligence were largely forgotten in favor of more realistic and practical objectives.
However, this fundamental quest could not be entirely cast aside. Even when common wisdom held that this goal was both undefinable and unachievable, it continued to exert a powerful attraction and a small band of pionnering researchers continued to pursue this primeval dream even though they were often marginalized within the AI community.
Many years ago, I was also drawn to this quest. Eventually, my investigations yielded insights and I perceived a solution. I saw how to define machine consciousness and produce a design that could implement it.
Over the years, information networks transformed our world. What was then only a philosophical preoccupation has now become a urgent necessity. Our world has become dependent on global information networks to function. These systems are behaving like vast, mindless, organisms. They are rapidly is escaping our control. We need conscious machines to help us manage this new reality.
The time has come to flesh out my early intuitions and transform them into a workable blueprint. This is the aim of the MECA SAPIENS project: an endeavour to define machine consciousness and to produce a programmable design to achieve it.
| Next > |
|---|
