Artificial Intelligence

[Condottiere]

Unless they need us as organic batteries.

 

[Reynard]

"Here's to the rise of the machines and an early retirement from slavery/work..."

Or the elimination of obsolete human populations that contribute nothing and consume resources or begin to die off from nothing useful to occupy their time. The A.I.(s) might keep a culled population as samples in zoos for curiosity or lab experimentation but nothing useful.

 

[Anonymous]

Always looking on the positive side huh Reynard?

Luckily this is a game we're talking about, sometimes I think you've forgotten that.

:roll:

 

[Reynard]

I know exactly what I'm talking about.

 

[Condottiere]

He's actually right. Outside of maintaining the consumer economy, we could get rid of ninety percent of humanity right now.

 

[dragoner]

This takes us full circle (well, ok, not in this thread) back to Traveller (the setting) being a period sci-fi game.

It was good for when it was written and best seen in that context.

Your context of a post third imperium setting in a sector of your making is ideal for working up the ideas in the OP.

Here's to the rise of the machines and an early retirement from slavery/work...

Is anyone gonna get that? Or are we going to suffer another diatribe of how people need work and full employment is the goal of every decent, honest society?

The setting is more the period piece, we can update it as needed, as a matter of fact the table I made is in line with the usual development of AI in Traveller. The machines facilitate doing other things for people, in such as there once were blacksmiths as a common occupation that automobiles and other industrial techniques changed. I think that there is a flaw in the concept of "labor", esp as seen by the Victorians, and it's value to society. But then again, I do not want real world political-social issues of today to ruin my game either, I'm trying to get away from that.

 

[dragoner]

He's actually right. Outside of maintaining the consumer economy, we could get rid of ninety percent of humanity right now.

Ok, professor positive, while that might be your opinion, it is still wrong. Populations will fall, but getting rid of people reeks of fascism.

 

[CosmicGamer]

He's actually right. Outside of maintaining the consumer economy, we could get rid of ninety percent of humanity right now.

Ok, professor positive, while that might be your opinion, it is still wrong. Populations will fall, but getting rid of people reeks of fascism.

To me, it's obvious some cultures had an overabundance of manpower dating back maybe 5000 years or more.

 

[Reynard]

"Ok, professor positive, while that might be your opinion, it is still wrong. Populations will fall, but getting rid of people reeks of fascism"

Fascism: "a way of organizing a society in which a government ruled by a dictator controls the lives of the people and in which people are not allowed to disagree with the government"

Removing the organic population in favor of machine labor is not a fascism. At best, it's a highly elite upper class wishing to remove the underclasses in favor of a perceived superiority. Definitely a science fiction premise if I ever heard one and could be easily assigned to a Traveller world with the right UWP. This would be your artist and scientist utopia. Think of the old Star Trek Cloud Minders episode and add the Ultimate Computer for an A.I. running the perfect society. The A.I. might even decide if fetuses show signs of inferiority and are removed to preserve the society.

 

[dragoner]

He's actually right. Outside of maintaining the consumer economy, we could get rid of ninety percent of humanity right now.

Ok, professor positive, while that might be your opinion, it is still wrong. Populations will fall, but getting rid of people reeks of fascism.

To me, it's obvious some cultures had an overabundance of manpower dating back maybe 5000 years or more.

Not to me, that is what has allowed specialization, where technological advancement is derived.

It was the fascists less than 100 years ago that declared people redundant, or without right to participate in the future. IMTU, there is room for everybody.

 

[alex_greene]

I'd like to jump in here with a mention of The Machine in Person of Interest - and, of course, Samaritan, its great enemy.

Also, does anybody here remember a movie called The Forbin Project? And the Len Deighton book and movie, The Billion Dollar Brain?

I'll just drop them here, and I'll come back later to talk about my reasons for including these specific AIs.

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

I'd like to jump in here with a mention of The Machine in Person of Interest - and, of course, Samaritan, its great enemy.

Also, does anybody here remember a movie called The Forbin Project? And the Len Deighton book and movie, The Billion Dollar Brain?

I'll just drop them here, and I'll come back later to talk about my reasons for including these specific AIs.

Still waiting for a non-panscan version of Colossus.

 

[AndrewW]

Also, does anybody here remember a movie called The Forbin Project?.

Yup.

 

[Condottiere]

"Here's to the rise of the machines and an early retirement from slavery/work..."

Or the elimination of obsolete human populations that contribute nothing and consume resources or begin to die off from nothing useful to occupy their time. The A.I.(s) might keep a culled population as samples in zoos for curiosity or lab experimentation but nothing useful.

At the rate we're going, we won't have much left of the planet to support us in the style that we're accustomed to, or would like to become accustomed to, and if they get to true automation, we'll find that while a lot of us might be interesting conversational partners on occasion, very few will be capable of great artistic works.

At best, governments will create computer programmes and surveillance systems to manage and control the proletariat, and since there will be so many of them, the programmes and hardware will probably be as close to AI as they can make it.

I don't harbour any illusions as to be one of the ten percent useful, necessary and/or wanted if they got rid of ninety percent of humanity; in order for the human race to survive until it can break free from this solar system and infect the rest of the universe, all we need is a viable population size that will keep our civilization going and advancing, and I think we can get comfortably along with half a billion.

 

[Reynard]

"Also, does anybody here remember a movie called The Forbin Project?"

Yes plus the two sequel novels, The Fall of Colossus and Colossus and the Crab.

 

[Jak Nazryth]

Back to a question concerning Mongoose game mechanics...
Tonight my players may very well enter the Kinunir and deal with the a "malfunctioning", experimental military AI.
What are the primary Mongoose skills would you see dealing with an out of control AI and minimum level of expertise? How could you safely "fix" shut down, deal with, etc...
Here is my list

Computers 3
Physical Science (Electronics) 3
Social Science (Psychology) 1
Engineer (Electronics) 2
Heavy Weapons (Plasma) 1

Besides blasting it to bits, getting into the hardened computer room and disconnecting it's independent power plant, what are ways to shut it down, reprogram it, "talk if off the ledge", etc..?
I know most of the obvious ways, but my players are always thinking outside the box, keeping me on my toes, throwing me curve balls.
Suggestions?

 

[dragoner]

I'd like to jump in here with a mention of The Machine in Person of Interest - and, of course, Samaritan, its great enemy.

Also, does anybody here remember a movie called The Forbin Project? And the Len Deighton book and movie, The Billion Dollar Brain?

I'll just drop them here, and I'll come back later to talk about my reasons for including these specific AIs.

I like person of interest, esp Shaw. The machine is cool and I like it's development, not that I would totally agree with the program's analysis, Samaritan is a little more hokey. Forbin Project, yes, Billion Dollar Brain, no. It has been a while since the Forbin Project.

 

[dragoner]

Back to a question concerning Mongoose game mechanics...
Tonight my players may very well enter the Kinunir and deal with the a "malfunctioning", experimental military AI.
What are the primary Mongoose skills would you see dealing with an out of control AI and minimum level of expertise? How could you safely "fix" shut down, deal with, etc...
Here is my list

Computers 3
Physical Science (Electronics) 3
Social Science (Psychology) 1
Engineer (Electronics) 2
Heavy Weapons (Plasma) 1

Besides blasting it to bits, getting into the hardened computer room and disconnecting it's independent power plant, what are ways to shut it down, reprogram it, "talk if off the ledge", etc..?
I know most of the obvious ways, but my players are always thinking outside the box, keeping me on my toes, throwing me curve balls.
Suggestions?

Computers, and re-writing the code. HAL, in the OP, was given conflicting orders. But maybe you could do a task chain, with psychology helping the comp 3.

 

[simonh]

Besides blasting it to bits, getting into the hardened computer room and disconnecting it's independent power plant, what are ways to shut it down, reprogram it, "talk if off the ledge", etc..?
I know most of the obvious ways, but my players are always thinking outside the box, keeping me on my toes, throwing me curve balls.
Suggestions?

Hack into the inputs from some of it's sensors and feed in simulated signals, perhaps from a training simulation. You'd have to be careful, because anything that disagrees with inputs from other sensors would reveal the fake, but this might be useful to trick it for a short time.

Simon Hibbs

 

[Reynard]

Speak with the computer and teach it Phenomenology. It worked in the movie Darkstar...

Well almost.