Is Artificial Consciousness possible and could you completely transfer one's self into an engineered artifact and how this can be used in Computer Applications?

         




Methodology and explanation of the topic

My research is going to be looking into the progress that was made in the field of Artificial Consciousness (AC), also known as Machine Consciousness or synthetic consciousness. In its definition, AC aims to synthesize artificial intelligence and cognitive robotics into a programmable computer system, where consciousness can be found. Looking into the most qualified and supported documentation over the last 10 years, I will be looking into the potential and effect of AC in Application Software.

In Computer Games, artificial intelligence (AI) is used for simulating human-like actions such as decision making to produce an illusion of intelligence in the behaviour of non-playable characters (NPC). The player can interact with a NPC in the form of bots as enemies or allies in cooperative gameplay. In different styles of games the game AI is able to deal with a lot of actions which range from decision theory, problem-solving, environment awareness to squad tactics and army control. But the limitations of game AI stretch so far, because achieving something more  complex using this approach like commonsense knowledge, which is known as situated AI, requires enormous amounts of ontological engineering. One way it could be done is to have the computer understand enough concepts so it can learn through sources like the internet. If introduced into gaming, in theory it can enhance the capabilities of a game AI with actions such as abstract thinking, language interpretation, adaptation, awareness, subjective experience and will. Furthermore I will be looking into devices which study the electrical activity along the human scalp, known as Electroencephalography (EEG), and translate that information using computer software to achieve input and control computer applications. My research will be focused at how much of this is possible and what innovations could this bring to casual gaming or training and theoretical simulations.

In theoretical debates about the plausibility of AC there are many solid arguments on both sides and taking an agnostic view will allow me to examine and evaluate all ideas and possibilities for how much is known about AC. Theorists that are skeptical of AC hold that consciousness can only be realized in a physical environment as it has properties which necessarily depend on physical constitution. On the other hand proponents of AC believe that consciousness can be realised in properly designed and programmed computers. Igor Aleksander (1996) claims that the principles for creating a conscious machine already exist but that it would take forty years to train such a machine to understand language. So I’ll be looking only into project results and supported and approved claims before taking a route in one of the possible oppositions during the research.


There a lot of philosophical theories behind the different types of AC. In philosophical literature consciousness is divided into “cognitive” easy problems such as explaining object discrimination or verbal report and “phenomenal” hard problems which concerns those aspects of experience that seem to defy functional depiction, conceptual thought, qualia and sentience. But since such forms of “cognitive” or weaker AC such as shape recognition have already been achieved by computer software, I will be looking into the hard problems of consciousness.

If consciousness was found in a machine, there will be many ethical implications. If the synthesised being has a human-like consciousness then what rights should it have under law and what protection will it have from the physical conscious world. Because no such discovery has yet been made the subject is still legally considered as theoretical.



Literature Review

I have gathered the most useful research materials that I will be exploring more in depth once I reach that point in my essay. I have chosen those materials because of the relation they have between each other and the specific arguments that they have for proving the corresponding thesis.

Books :

1. Apocalyptic AI Visions of Heaven in Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, and Virtual Reality.

Apocalyptic AI provides extensive philosophical and psychological look into the theory of transferring one's consciousness into a powerful computer and continue living in a cyber world obsolete of the limitations of a physical body. It also looks at the religious view behind it and the perception of heaven, described by some religions like the place where you are free from your body and experience eternal happiness. The book also uses examples from modern age computer games such as Second Life and tries to explain the behaviour behind Massively Multiplayer Online Games which replicate day-to-day life. Furthermore, as an anthropological study, the book assesses the  significance  and  presence  of Apocalyptic AI in modern culture, not its truthfulness or moral righteousness (Geraci, 2010:2). This material will be useful as it questions some of the main theological and ethical issues behind Machine Intelligence, which will be helpful to look at the theories form a global and cultural perspective. I am using this book together with Utopic Dreams and Apocalyptic Fantasies, which also talks about the ideal utopian world which is trouble-free and how dreams like this have formed one of the foundations of human desire (Geraci, 2010).

2. Utopic Dreams and Apocalyptic Fantasies.

The book looks into the psychological reason behind the immersiveness of modern video games and the reason for the pursuit of escape from our limited conditions and everyday lives with suffering and death (Wright, 2010). The material researches the cultural history stored in our civilization in religions like Christianity together with other pagan beliefs at the time. It describes what defines the twin poles of Western dreams and how those dreams are displayed through our modern day media such as books, movies, internet web sites, video games and etc. The book also looks into some psychological analysis of trending modern games from various genres and trying to find the reason for its ability to engage its audience.

3. World of Warcraft and Philosophy.

World of Warcraft and Philosophy is a compilation of in-depth philosophical essays which look into the most successful MMORPG ( massively multiplayer online role-playing game ) World of Warcraft which became a cultural phenomenon and triggered a massive production of MMORPG games in recent videogame history. In the book, questions like the dangers of artificial game events invading the player’s personal life, what we can learn from the factitious crisis control are when does an assumed identity become real are tackled by a team of philosophers. This source also looks deep into the gameplay and explains the whole progress of creating a synthetic idol in the form of a game-guide, which will be helpful for finding out more about how much would a gamer want to be involved in a futuristic consciously control game. It also looks in some of the methods for giving reward back to the gamer so he can be kept aroused during his game experience. Some of the philosophers include Yara Mitsuishi, Monica Evans, Tim Christopher, and Anna Janssen.

4. ‘They May be Pixels, but They’re MY Pixels’: Developing a Metric of Character Attachment in Role-Playing Video Games.

The source examines the phenomenon of internalisation and psychological merging of the player’s and character’s mind is Role-Playing Games ( RPGs) known as character attachment (CA) (Lewis et al.,2008:515). This a theoretical study behind the tangible connection that is made between the player and his fictional avatar. This paper also proposes a new metric for measuring CA which after validity testing has found that the CA scale has a relationship with self-esteem, addiction, game enjoyment and time spent playing games (Lewis et al.,2008). It also examines the solid difference between the CA levels of role-playing games and other character-driven video games.

5. ‘I, Avatar: The Culture and Consequences of Having a Second Life’

“The avatar is the protagonist, the protagonist’s development comes from events that happen within the system, and the driver of the avatar is the director, actor, and audience.”  Meadows (2007:23)

This book talks about the psychology that makes and drives us to create avatars in different mediums like social forums, video blogs (vlogs), 2D games and 3D games.The author looks at the avatar from a social view and how social interaction create a fiction record of your life which can be shared [23]. This book will be invaluable to my research as it goes into the complex question of

6. ‘Synthetic Worlds: The Business and Culture of Online Games’

In the texts of Synthetic Worlds, the author describes the richness of the persistent worlds of online games and what that creates from a business and economical point of view. The user base of 10 million players dispersed in different titles, provides a never ending marketing system where everything can be controlled and introduced.

“indeed treated like real money, by real people who are neither slow-witted nor insane.” Castrova (2006:145)

“some kind of shift in social salience, by which the synthetic world comes to bear as much weight as the real world” Castrova (2006:146)

In the first chapter he introduces the reader to the inside contents of an artificial online game world and the possibilities that this brings in real life economics. Further he explains how the weight of values in the virtual world are carried into the real world. In the second chapter the books describes the commitment of players and how this affects them in their personal lives . The third chapter explains how with the creation of something that so many people follow and see as a real thing, comes the desire for someone to change it or control it. It will be important to my research as it together with ‘They May be Pixels, but They’re MY Pixels’ and ‘I, Avatar’ it explains the culture of gamers and what defines ‘heaven’ in an online immersive world.

7. ‘Artificial Beings: The conscience of a Conscious Machine’

“I will present my reasons for developing my present research, and introduce the subject of this research: my colleague CAIA, which is an artificial scientist. Studying its behavior and its mechanisms will supply most of the examples of this book. Finally, I look at the domains where CAIA is carrying out research.”  Pitrat (2010:1)

The book researches the capabilities of a machine with Artificial Intelligence. It looks into studies about the machine’s behaviour and conscience. It explains the process that is taken to construct such a system and how to observe it. This is important as it leads through some of the steps of creating something with weak consciousness, or cognitive consciousness. It further explores the question of how to include the meaning of emotions. It also talks about the modification of a consciousness if one is found and how this could cause the machine to drift in an unwanted direction from which it might not be able to come back Pitrat (2010:219). It also researches theories of weather we can kill the created machine, cure it from illnesses and what is the impact on human consciousness from the whole process. This book has a really reliable source as it is based on an actual ongoing project with a working AI robot.


Journals and web articles:

1. Intelligent Artificial Systems.

“The realization of any intelligent process will be based on structural ingredients that:
a) For us, external observers, represent a propositional description of the knowledge the process exhibits, and
b) independently of any external attributed semantics, have a formal, but also causal and essential, role in producing the behavior that manifests such a knowledge.”

A presentation which looks into the definitions and first steps of understanding artificial knowledge and learning. It provides a brief history of the theory behind the key parts of Artificial Intelligence such as the turning machine, universal semimeasure and sequence prediction, the universal agent model and some others. It also looks at image recognition systems, linguistic models and cognitive architecture for artificial vision. The resource is not very rich but provides important paths and methodology about the whole process of creating artificial consciousness.

2. Artificial Neuroconsciousness An Update.

A great resource for introduction into the whole subject and some of its first appearance in theoretical studies. It also includes extensive theoretical explanation of the key parts of human consciousness like will, critique, prediction, language, emotions and etc. and illustrating them by means of characteristic state structures. It is a great resource because it lists some of the necessary parts to create a cognitive machine and discusses the theories which come alongside with it of finding consciousness in those machines.

3. Artificial Consciousness: Utopia or Real Possibility?

“• Can computers think or do they just calculate?
• Is consciousness a human prerogative?
• Does consciousness depend on the material that comprises the human brain,
or can computer hardware replicate consciousness?”  Butazzo (2001)

These are some of the questions that this resource is going to cover and to do so it covers various disciplines like computer science, neurophysiology, philosophy and religion. It will be a useful material throughout the whole essay as it covers a lot of the psychological and religious questions that arise with the subject.

4. EPOC Neuroheadset.

The EPOC Headset is a device developed by Emotiv and it is a

“high resolution, neuro-signal acquisition and processing wireless neuroheadset.  It uses a set of sensors to tune into electric signals produced by the brain to detect player thoughts, feelings and expressions and connects wirelessly to most PCs.”

This is a great product that brings so much innovation in computer input and has great potential in control and feedback of online characters. It also has an ongoing research so it is a great place for finding new articles that concern the field.

5. Emochat: emotional Instant Messaging with the Epoc Headset.

“Interpersonal communication benefits greatly from the emotional information encoded by facial expression, body language, and tone of voice, however this information is noticeably missing from typical instant message communication. This work investigates how instant message communication can be made richer by including emotional information provided by the Epoc headset.” Wright (2010)

The research paper gives extensive knowledge on how EEG activity or human emotions can be translated into human emotional states which can be included in digital conversations. It is an important part from the essay as it reveals technology which can be introduced into videogames to create a more native and concise dialog between players.

6. "ABE: An Agent-Based Software Architecture for a Multimodal Emotion Recognition Framework"

This is a paper which talks about a new multimodal emotion recognition framework for computer software such as video games and learning environments making them empathetic systems. This is a very important research as it can implement such complex systems in game developer projects. The paper provides in-depth explanations about the process of creating such library and its complexity.

7. The non-invasive Berlin Brain-Computer Interface.

“Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) systems establish a direct communication channel from the brain to an output device. These systems use brain signals recorded from the scalp, the surface of the cortex, or from inside the brain to enable users to control a variety of applications.” (Blankertz et al. 2007)

This material describes the advantages of BCI systems as they can provide novel control options for paralysed patients. In contrast to other similar systems, the Berlin BCI uses physiologically meaningful and adaptive features which can relate to the subject variability. A short 20 minute calibration can have a BCI controlled machine be ready to be used by the subject. This is an important part from my research as it describes how those systems “learn” and how this can be used in controlling the mechanics of an artificial in-game character.

8. Using Brain-Computer interfaces to detect human satisfaction in human-robot interaction.

“This article discusses the use of a brain–computer interface (BCI) to obtain emotional feedback from a human in response to the motion of humanoid robots in collaborative environments.“ Esfahani (2010)

This article describes experiments and algorithms that use brain activity collected with BCI in order to estimate the level of satisfaction. The subject controls a robot’s movement through the BCI and the resulted action is observed by the subject. Based on what the subject is seeing creates some satisfaction level which is used to force the robot to correct or improve its behaviour.



Bibliography:


Books:

Aleksander, I. (1996) ‘Impossible Minds: My neurons, My Consciousness’, Imperial College Press.

Haikonen, P. (2003), The Cognitive Approach to Conscious Machines, Exeter, UK: Imprint Academic

Geraci, Robert (2010) Apocalyptic AI Visions of Heaven in Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, and Virtual Reality, New York: Oxford University Press Inc. Available at: http://herts.eblib.com/patron/FullRecord.aspx?p=477697 [last accessed 22/01/2013]

Wright, J. Talmadge (2010) Utopic Dreams and Apocalyptic Fantasies. Playmoth: Lexington Books. Available at: http://herts.eblib.com/patron/FullRecord.aspx?p=634254 [last accessed 22/01/2013]

Nordlinger, J., Cuddy, L. (2009) World of Warcraft and Philosophy. USA: Carus Publishing Company. Available at: http://www.herts.eblib.com/patron/FullRecord.aspx?p=547560 [last accessed 16/01/2013]

Lewis, M., Weber, R., Bowman, N. (2008 ) ‘They May be Pixels, but They’re MY Pixels’: Developing a Metric of Character Attachment in Role-Playing Video Games.

Meadows, Mark S.(2007) ‘I, Avatar: The Culture and Consequences of Having a Second Life’. Available at: http://proquest.safaribooksonline.com/book/web-applications-and-services/9780321550231 [last accessed 15/12/2012]

Edward Castronova, (2006) ‘Synthetic Worlds: The Business and Culture of Online Games’

Pitrat, Jacques (2010) ‘Artificial Beings: The conscience of a Conscious Machine’. Available at: http://herts.eblib.com/patron/FullRecord.aspx?p=477697 [last accessed 19/11/2012]


Science journals and articles:


Gaglio, S. Intelligent Artificial Systems, Available at: http://www.consciousness.it/iwac2005/Material/Gaglio.pdf [last accessed 20/01/2013]

Aleksander, I. (1995) Artificial Neuroconsciousness An Update. Available at: http://web.archive.org/web/20050408042834/http://www.ee.ic.ac.uk/research/neural/publications/iwann.html [last accessed 10/01/2013]

Buttazzo, G. (2001) Artificial Consciousness: Utopia or Real Possibility? Available at: http://retis.sssup.it/~giorgio/paps/2001/ieeecm01.pdf [last accessed 05/01/2013]

EPOC Neuroheadset, Available at: http://www.emotiv.com/apps/epoc/299/ [last accessed 22/12/2012]  

Wright, P. (2010) Emochat: emotional Instant Messaging with the Epoc Headset, Available at: http://www.slideshare.net/fwrigh2/emochat-emotional-instant-messaging-with-the-epoc-headset [last accessed 22/01/2013]

Gonzalez-Sanchez, J.; Chavez-Echeagaray, M.E.; Atkinson, R.; Burleson, W.; , "ABE: An Agent-Based Software Architecture for a Multimodal Emotion Recognition Framework," Software Architecture (WICSA), 2011 9th Working IEEE/IFIP Conference on , vol., no., pp.187-193, 20-24 June 2011, Available at: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5959690&isnumber=5959683 [last accessed 10/12/2012]

Blankertz B., Dornhege G., Krauledat M., Müller KR., Curio G. (2007) The non-invasive Berlin Brain-Computer Interface, Available at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17475513 [last accessed 10/01/2013]

Esfahani, T. (2010) Using Brain-Computer interfaces to detect human satisfaction in human-robot interaction, Available at: http://www.me.ucr.edu/~etarkeshesfahan/IJHR2011.pdf [last accessed 15/12/2012]