Intelligent Agents Are Immortal

One surprising implication of Intelligent Design theory is that intelligent agents must be immortal.

First, let's define immortality.  Immortality is not the same as indestructible.  Something may be immortal, but still capable of being taken out of existence.  What immortality means is that the thing will not decay and cease to exist through the normal course of events.

Now, many are probably familiar with the famous syllogism: "All men are mortal.  Socrates is a man.  Therefore, Socrates is mortal."  What is it that makes men mortal?  It is that our human bodies decay, and eventually reach the point where they no longer function.  It is quite clear that through the normal course of events human bodies are mortal.

However, let's say we have an intelligent agent with a physical body.  Just because the physical body decays does not mean the intelligent agent is mortal.  Why do I state this?  The question to ask is: is an intelligent agent identical to its body?  If not, then the destruction of the body does not necessarily entail the destruction of the agent.

So, is the agent identical to its body?  Intelligent Design theory states this is not the case.  All intelligent agents are distinguished by their ability to create CSI.  But, necessity and chance cannot create CSI.  The physical body is a mechanism of necessity and chance, and consequently cannot create CSI.  Since the agent can create CSI and its body cannot, the agent is clearly not identical to its body as it is capable of something the body cannot do.

Furthermore, the agent cannot be a result of the body.  Just as the body cannot itself create CSI, it cannot create something else that creates CSI, as it would then be creating CSI indirectly.  So, if the agent, being a creator of CSI, therefore does not come from the body, then removing the body does not remove the source of the agent.  Consequently, whatever the agent is is not subject to the same decay the body undergoes.

If the process of decay is what makes the body mortal, and the agent is not subject to the process of decay, the agent cannot be mortal.  Therefore, intelligent agents are immortal.

You are not your brain

Imagine someone makes an exact replica of your brain.  Now there are two physical instances of your brain in existence with the exact same inputs and outputs.  Which one is you?  Why, the original of course.

Therefore, you are not your brain.

How can Google hire charlatan Kurzweil?!?

In response to:

http://www.thebestschools.org/bestschoolsblog/2013/03/12/ray-kurzweils-theory-human-mind-works-others-and-fairness-worse/

Why Ray Kurzweil’s theory about how the human mind works is not better than the others, and, ...  in fairness, no worse.

Let me start off by saying I'm surprised someone of Kurzweil's caliber doesn't know about the No Free Lunch Theorem and its implications!

Regardless of whether he's a materialist or not, he should know the NFLT proves all AI algorithms are equivalent, and there's nothing special about his particular idea.

If Kurzweil has read Russell and Norvig's "AI: A Modern Approach", which is THE AI textbook (and is written by the director of research at the company where he works!!!) Kurzweil would know all AI is search and representation.  The whole point of the NFLT is that it proves there is no one best search algorithm, they are all exactly equivalent over all problem domains.  It doesn't matter what philosophy he happens to believe, he could be materialist, substance dualist, Unicornitarian, Gnomist, whatever.  The only contribution he can make is to say what what particular problem domain his AI algorithm happens to be good in.

This is not an ideological or philosophical issue.  The NFLT is mathematically proven, recognized by all computer scientists, and he should know a fundamental result in his own field of expertise!  This is a supposed computer science genius who doesn't know basic graduate computer science!

I can't believe Google hired this charlatan!

At least PZ Myers gets it right for once:

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/12/31/Google-Hires-Grand-Prophet-Of-The-Singularity

P.Z. Myers calls Kurzweil “one of the greatest hucksters of the age.” Furthermore, Professor Myers has said he’s "completely baffled by Kurzweil's popularity, and in particular the respect he gets in some circles, since his claims simply do not hold up to even casually critical examination."

Clearly Google needs a witch doctor for their religion of transhumanism!

The Singularity, says Professor Myers, is “a New Age spiritualism—that's all it is. Even geeks want to find God somewhere, and Kurzweil provides it for them." 

But Google's newly hired director of engineering isn't laughing.  He's serious (im)mortally so.  "I find death unacceptable,"  says Mr. Kurzweil. "Natural selection isn't significant anymore.  Technological change is the cutting edge of evolution."

As the wise GKC once said:

"When people stop believing in God, they don't believe in nothing — they believe in anything."

Is Vitalism an alternative explanation to Intelligent Design?

Dr. Nagel's claims that while ID effectively shows the inadequacy of chance and necessity to explain biological organisms and processes, intelligent agency is not the only alternative and is less preferable to a more unitive principle.  Dr. Barham extends this argument with a few examples based around the more ancient notion of vitalism.

http://www.thebestschools.org/bestschoolsblog/2012/11/12/nagel-dembski-life-mind/

Vitalism does seem to be one implication of ID based science, as shown by Dr. Wells and Dr. Sternberg.  For example, in the case of fetal development, claiming that the entire developmental process is the product of God's continuous direct intervention seems equivalent to saying the same about the operation of all physical processes - since such an intervention can explain everything it would explain nothing.  Furthermore, since the fetus is not conscious for a significant portion of development, the development can't be attributed to the fetus' conscious activity.

Additionally, Dr. Sternberg has shown the information necessary for the fetal development cannot be contained within the original sperm and egg.  Therefore, some external source of developmental information is necessary.  I'm not sure if Dr. Sternberg has ruled out the fetus' environment, but my impression is he did not think the physical matter involved in the fetus' development could account for the necessary developmental information.

So, if neither fetus nor environment can account for its development there must be a non-physical source of information that develops the fetus, which begins to look a lot like Aristotlian vitalism, and does not need direct intelligent agency to explain its operation.

However, this does not solve the information problem, it merely pushes the problem up a level, and Dr. Dembski's design inference argument is just as applicable.  Again, the question must be asked where does the information of the non-physical vital process come from?  What is needed is an information creator.

Materialism and human rights

Recently an MIT researcher argued robots may gain legal rights:

http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/12/09/04/2034225/social-robots-may-gain-legal-rights-says-mit-researcher

The arguments for why this could and should be done revolve around anthropomorphism and proper conduct.  Such arguments do not in fact support robots having rights, but are more similar to laws we have now against media that portray, and allow people to engage in certain acts that would be atrocious if real.  In this case, we are not giving rights to fictional characters by outlawing such products.

However, from a materialistic point of view, extending rights to robots does make sense.  Within materialism, humans are essentially very complex robots, and by giving rights to humans we are already giving rights to robots.  There is little difference giving rights to robots produced by evolution and giving rights to robots produced by these robots.

Rights do not stop at robots, though.  A robot is essentially software hooked up to a set of actuators and sensors.  Software can be embedded in many different media, besides silicon and circuitry.  For example, rocks in a desert can be a computer: http://xkcd.com/505/

Consequently, robotic software can be embedded in this rock computer, turning the desert into a robot, and thus conferring rights to the desert.

In short, pretty much any physical object can end up getting rights within materialism.  So next time your computer locks up and you start beating it with your keyboard, careful or it might take you to court!

The question remains, if materialism is not the answer for giving a robust and coherent account of human rights, what can?  Well, Intelligent Design points us in the right direction:
http://appliedintelligentdesign.blogspot.com/2011/10/human-dignity.html

What does the Bible mean by "Natural"?

Some think the biblical language about homosexuality being unnatural is merely referring to cultural norms. However, that is not the case:

The ancient worldview is that there is a moral order to reality, which is tied to functionality. So, the reason why male/female sex is natural is because the function of sex is procreation. This may be a cultural belief in the sense that a certain culture held this belief, but it is not cultural in that the assumptions are purposefully based on societal norms. The assumptions are based on primitive observations of the world.

Today we, especially the highly educated, don't hold these assumptions: A) there is inherent functionality in nature, B) this inherent functionality prescribes a moral order, and C) following this moral order is key to flourishing and happiness as human beings. It is we who have had to be educated that our primitive observations are wrong, so technically speaking our views are the more 

culturally conditioned.

You can notice this in every day language, such as how we use the terms right and wrong and natural and unnatural - they all tend to be tied to the notion of a moral order and natural function. For example, you probably don't consider it too strange to say that eyes are for seeing, the mouth is for speaking and eating, the stomach is for digesting food, etc. But these are all instances of a primitive notion of functionality, which we have been taught is wrong.

However, none of this is to say the primitive view is right and our modern view is wrong. It is to show that people in Paul's day did not think they were referring to cultural norms when saying homosexuality was unnnatural. What they are saying is homosexuality goes against the natural purpose of sex and is destructive to humankind as a whole because it reduces the likelihood that the society will survive (i.e. it contributes to reducing the birthrate below sustainable levels, see Europe). For example, Plato gives the death penalty for homosexuality and masturbation in his Laws dialogue for precisely this reason. Christians went further and claimed the natural moral order was ordained by God Himself, and those who engaged in unnatural behavior were going against God, not merely going against nature.

Intelligent Design is one scientific technique for identifying instances of functionality in nature, the same functionality that underlies the traditional moral order.

Why environmentalism needs Intelligent Design, and Intelligent Design implies environmentalism

The big implication of ID is that human beings, as intelligent agents, are completely unique out of all the other created things on earth.  They are the only beings exhibiting the ability to create CSI.

if can infer that CSI makes nature run (it seems to consist of many very complex systems held together by precise functional specifications), and furthermore than the 2nd law of thermodynamics leads to the breakdown of CSI, then CSI must be maintained by some intelligent agent to keep nature running.

A Biblical example is the injunction in Genesis for man to cultivate creation.  There are also a number of historical examples showing man must continue to cultivate creation or it falls apart.  For example, archeologists believe parts of the rainforest were grown by Indians and the soil construction was specially designed to replenish itself. Another example is the great plains in America.  Archeologists believe the plains were purposefully designed by the Indians as grazing grounds, and once the Indians disappeared from the land the animals began to reproduce out of control, which gave rise to buffalo stampedes.  Finally, the reason why there are so many forest fires in Californian forests is because the Indians used to conduct controlled burns to keep the fire fuel from building up.  However, current environmentalist push a non-intervention approach to maintaining the forest and discourage controlled burns, hence the greater number of forest fires.

Anyways, I see ID having two general implications.  First, contra modern environmentalists, humans have an extremely important role in the well being of nature, and if humans were eliminated, as some environmental extremists want, then nature would likely collapse.  However, this also means that we cannot just subvert nature to our own ends.  We must understand the functional information stored in nature before changing its functionality.  Our technology will contain much more CSI if it is built in line with nature's master plan than if built contrary to natures plan.