Does suffering REALLY matter?

[mistermack]

I know that it matters to the sufferer, and their close friends and relatives, but should it bother the rest of us?

It’s not going to be long before we make the first machine that’s capable of suffering. We already have cars that alert the driver when it is uncomfortable. Some make changes to the behaviour of the car, so that it can’t overheat and damage the engine. It’s rudimentary suffering. As the computers get more and more advanced, it will get more and more like real suffering.

Once we’ve made a machine that is aware of it’s distress, will it be immoral to allow it to suffer? Or should we say, fuck it, it’s only wires and silicon chips. It will never matter?

Obviously, it will take a long time to make a machine that’s the mental equivalent of a human.
But it must be close, or already there, to make one the equivalent of an ant.
Most people would think it’s immoral to make an ant suffer.
Would it be the same, for a machine of equivalent, or greater awareness?

Or does it actually matter at all?

[Steve]

I never took the dents out of my truck. Just pocketed the insurance money. Am I immoral now? OK, I did get a wheel alignment done, and it had to get road tested for its new status as a 'salvage' vehicle. But I got more from the insurance than I paid for it. This is a good thing, right?

[cronus]

Anything is possible but a machine is a machine and very advanced machines like philosophical zombies will fool all but the most astute. There is no need for barbarism though and when in doubt it might be best to assume someone is in. Then behave accordingly.

[JacksSmirkingRevenge]

Interesting question. I've rolled this around before but didn't really come up with any real answers.

I don't think that self-aware a machine that's aware it has been damaged could necessarily be said to be suffering, though. It would have to be able to process the information in some sort of emotional way? Maybe? I dunno.

[mistermack]

Interesting question. I've rolled this around before but didn't really come up with any real answers.

I don't think that self-aware a machine that's aware it has been damaged could necessarily be said to be suffering, though. It would have to be able to process the information in some sort of emotional way? Maybe? I dunno.

That's why the ant is an interesting example. Do they have emotions? And if not, is it ok to burn them up with a magnifying glass?
It's not going to be long at all, before machines will be able to be far more self aware and emotional than an ant.
They will simply get higher and higher up the equivalent ladder of the animal kingdom.

It's not the fact that something is living that makes the difference. We can do whatever we like to plants. We can stress them, distress them, burn them alive, nobody gives a hoot. So it really is down to awareness, self awareness, the consciousness of harm that is happening to the self.
Machines will be doing all of that.

[Blind groper]

Just to give you a time line. Moores Law says that the number of connections in a computer will double each 2 years. This has been true for 50 years so far. If it continues into the future, the first computer with as many connections as the human brain will be built in the year 2035.

I am not claiming this will be the equivalent of a human brain. But with exponential computer growth, such a beast will not happen much after 2035.

[JimC]

Interesting question. I've rolled this around before but didn't really come up with any real answers.

I don't think that self-aware a machine that's aware it has been damaged could necessarily be said to be suffering, though. It would have to be able to process the information in some sort of emotional way? Maybe? I dunno.

That's why the ant is an interesting example. Do they have emotions? And if not, is it ok to burn them up with a magnifying glass?
It's not going to be long at all, before machines will be able to be far more self aware and emotional than an ant.
They will simply get higher and higher up the equivalent ladder of the animal kingdom.

It's not the fact that something is living that makes the difference. We can do whatever we like to plants. We can stress them, distress them, burn them alive, nobody gives a hoot. So it really is down to awareness, self awareness, the consciousness of harm that is happening to the self.
Machines will be doing all of that.

A major hobby of mine as a barbaric child...

Along with excavating their nests with fireworks...

[Audley Strange]

Good question. I'd say that one considers their own suffering matters and compute ways to mitigate and avoid it, those with empathy extrapolate that slightly further and attempt to protect others. So I'd say suffering is significant to development. However it's like you've got the question backwards. Suffering doesn't matter at all, it itself is detrimental, though the results of it may not be. It is our attempts to avoid suffering that makes us who we are, our endurance of it, not the suffering itself.

[Hermit]

Once we’ve made a machine that is aware of it’s distress, will it be immoral to allow it to suffer? Or should we say, fuck it, it’s only wires and silicon chips. It will never matter?

Obviously, it will take a long time to make a machine that’s the mental equivalent of a human.
But it must be close, or already there, to make one the equivalent of an ant.
Most people would think it’s immoral to make an ant suffer.
Would it be the same, for a machine of equivalent, or greater awareness?

Or does it actually matter at all?

As long as we manufacture machines, it doesn't matter. They're no more than labour-saving devices of our artifice, like the Electric Monk.

High on a rocky promontory sat an Electric Monk on a bored horse. From under its rough woven cowl the Monk gazed unblinkingly down into another valley, with which it was having a problem.

The day was hot, the sun stood in an empty hazy sky and beat down upon the gray rocks and the scrubby, parched grass. Nothing moved, not even the Monk. The horse's tail moved a little, swishing slightly to try and move a little air, but that was all. Otherwise, nothing moved.

The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watched tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/de ... 0671746723

[mistermack]

People might ignore the suffering of a machine, because it's a machine.
A light comes on in your dashboard, telling you that your engine is far too hot. It's low on oil, and blowing smoke out of the back. But you're tired, and want to get home, and it's only a machine, so you drive on.

But what if the manufacturer programmed the car to cry, like a baby in pain? And begged you to stop, because it's hurting.
I'll bet that would be more effective than a blinking red light. You hear that crying, you feel the power draining away, and the car begs you to stop.
You would have to be pretty callous to keep on regardless.
Once machines get more intelligent, the makers will be making them appeal to the emotions for all sorts of reasons. The distinction between living creature and machine will get progressively blurred.

[Audley Strange]

People might ignore the suffering of a machine, because it's a machine.
A light comes on in your dashboard, telling you that your engine is far too hot. It's low on oil, and blowing smoke out of the back. But you're tired, and want to get home, and it's only a machine, so you drive on.

But what if the manufacturer programmed the car to cry, like a baby in pain? And begged you to stop, because it's hurting.
I'll bet that would be more effective than a blinking red light. You hear that crying, you feel the power draining away, and the car begs you to stop.
You would have to be pretty callous to keep on regardless.
Once machines get more intelligent, the makers will be making them appeal to the emotions for all sorts of reasons. The distinction between living creature and machine will get progressively blurred.

We'd become desensitised to it, which is why we have been happily killing everything we can for as long as we have. To give it a simulacra of emotions would be utterly perverse.

[Seth]

"Suffering" is a philosophical moral human construct that's entirely subjective. "Suffering" doesn't exist in nature. Pain or discomfort are evolved sensations that inform the organism of danger to its existence, nothing more or less. Non-sentient animals don't "suffer," they merely experience pain or discomfort as part of the process of survival...or non-survival.

Creating an electronic machine that senses pain or discomfort and then allowing that device to experience the sensation is neither moral nor immoral, it's simply a human-created method of protecting the equipment from damage in the same way that pain and fear protect a living organism from damage.

[pErvinalia]

Interesting question. I've rolled this around before but didn't really come up with any real answers.

I don't think that self-aware a machine that's aware it has been damaged could necessarily be said to be suffering, though. It would have to be able to process the information in some sort of emotional way? Maybe? I dunno.

Yeah. This would seem to me that this comes down to a question of consciousness. When we work that out, then we can be certain (or just more certain?) that a particular machine has consciousness and can suffer. This is the old p-zombie/turning-test thing.

[pErvinalia]

Just to give you a time line. Moores Law says that the number of connections in a computer will double each 2 years. This has been true for 50 years so far. If it continues into the future, the first computer with as many connections as the human brain will be built in the year 2035.

I am not claiming this will be the equivalent of a human brain. But with exponential computer growth, such a beast will not happen much after 2035.

Moore's law is already slowing down in computing because we are approaching physical limits with the current architecture (i.e. macro transistors), and energy supply and heat generation problems. It will all kick off again when they finally sort out a quantum computer.

[mistermack]

Just to give you a time line. Moores Law says that the number of connections in a computer will double each 2 years. This has been true for 50 years so far. If it continues into the future, the first computer with as many connections as the human brain will be built in the year 2035.

I am not claiming this will be the equivalent of a human brain. But with exponential computer growth, such a beast will not happen much after 2035.

Moore's law is already slowing down in computing because we are approaching physical limits with the current architecture (i.e. macro transistors), and energy supply and heat generation problems. It will all kick off again when they finally sort out a quantum computer.

That's interesting, but it will hardly affect the OP problem, as an ant has a miniscule brain, so computers can easily pass ants, mice, or even humans, without harnessing quantum effects.
The scope is there for a machine with all of the feelings of a human, and intelligence far in advance of ours.

I wonder if an ant actually suffers, in the way that we experience it, or in the way that a car computer experiences it.
I suspect that it's far closer to a computer, than a human. It's just getting signals that tell it that some pre-determined action needs to happen.
After all, they come out of the egg with all of the necessary knowledge and behaviour hard-wired in their brains.