Re: advantages of uploading (was Re: re [2]: What is "New

Hagbard Celine (hagbard@ix.netcom.com)
Thu, 12 Jun 1997 01:59:10 -0400


Max More wrote:
>
> At 04:37 PM 6/11/97 -0600, Brent wrote:
> >
> >
> > And the ability to spontaneously install things like doctorate
> >degrees and/or life time memories such as practicing the piano for a
> >life time or studying math for a life time...
>
> How exactly do you think we will do that as uploads?

It might be a tad overzealous to ask "how exactly?"

> It's not obvious that
> a change of platform will instantly make us totally malleable or give us
> the ability easily to simply plug in new abilities.

Agreed.

> I'm not saying it can't
> happen, but I do think this assumption is usually made without argument.

If ability is a matter of information, then as an upload, no known
ability is out of reach. However, it seems unlikely to me (stick neck
out) that an ability arises out of a mere confluence of data. Skills
like playing the piano don't seem to arise out of your knowledge of
music since an eye-hand motor skill is involved. Similarly, while a
doctorate degree may be conferred along with the corresponding
informational foundation, the ability to synthesize the data is a
product of training in the particular field. I wonder if
"hunch-tendency" is even a separate and correspndingly programmable
trait?

At the very least, despite the fact that mere information may not confer
actual ability, a database of all human kowledge accessible by an upload
at speeds beyond any we might fathom is definitely an advantage -- all
with perfect recall, and all at the burst of a thought.

It sure beats studying.

-- 
Hagbard Celine

Not a clerk of the nostalgia of the declining ruling class.