GRAVITY FOUR -- Saturday, September 19, 1992

Items are the basic unit of information in Gravity. Now I know today's pet word is "object". I deliberately avoid the term because it connotes a sense of actuality, of concrete out-there-ness, that I don't like.

This coffee mug is an object. My novel is an item. My cat Cato is an
object (though he thinks he's a god). This sentence is an item.

It's important to distinguish between information and what it represents. There's also the matter of subject versus object, which I won't get into right now. Having information structures appear to be autonomous, that is, giving data structures the ability to do their own processing, is a useful but inaccurate trend, which arose because of where we've come from computationally. I don't think it reflects how we really use information. It does make life for programmers easier, however.

I've spent a lot of time wrestling with which words to use, partly because of the specialization worry I mentioned in the last note. It's crucial to recognise that terms like "object-oriented" and "artificial intelligence" are bound to alienate people. (Both of these terms are pet peeves of mine. I won't even start.

Yes I will. Sorry. Artificial intelligence is a really dumb phrase. I
have no problem with cognitive science/philosophy/psychology, but AI really bugs me. Partly because of the mystique it falsely creates. Partly
because it so poorly fits what it denotes. Even if I think of it as a
field devoted to creating artifacts that exhibit intelligence, which is
the only way of looking at the term that I can stomach, I can't help
wrestling with the real issues. Such as: if chess programs cannot be
said to be artificially intelligent, where do we draw the line?

Rainer Rilke wrote:

To the still earth say
I run.
To the swift water speak
I am.

My waterline condition, the point where I'll accept that a machine
has achieved true conscious self-awareness, is when it says to me "I Am" and means it. This, I think, will not happen until a machine becomes capable of experiencing pain (and I don't mean mere physical pain).

As for the field of Artifical Intelligence, I suggest that we concentrate
some of our efforts on Artificial Stupidity. At least then we'd have a
basis for comparison. )

I promise: tomorrow will be all meat.