Bees Feel Pain. Therefore…Insect Rights?

Animal Algorithms, animal rights, bees, consciousness, crops, Eric Cassell, Heather Browning, insect rights, insects, Kenny Torrella, London School of Economics, meat, neuroscience, Neuroscience & Mind, pain, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, pests, PETA, PNAS, Research, science
As we learn more from research about how various life forms respond to experiences, a more complex picture may raise political issues. Source
Read More

How Octopuses Got So Smart? “Junk DNA”

biology, birds, brain, California octopus, clams, common octopus, genome, intelligence, Intelligent Design, invertebrates, jumping genes, Junk DNA, Long Interspersed Nuclear Elements, mammals, marine invertebrates, Neuroscience & Mind, octopuses, oysters, transposons, unguided evolution
Jumping genes used to be dismissed as junk DNA which in turn was held to be slam-dunk evidence for unguided evolutionary processes. Source
Read More

Brain Size Doesn’t Determine Intelligence

Ars Technica, birds, brain size, brains, chimpanzees, genetic engineering, Homo sapiens, human brain, humans, information processing, Intelligent Design, jetliner, John Timmer, lemurs, London School of Economics, Michael Denton, Michel Hofman, monkeys, Neuroscience & Mind, octopus, oxygen, Peter Cochrane, primates, psychology, superintelligence, synaptic connections, The Miracle of Man
Brains are not simple, so many “just common sense” theories have fallen by the wayside. Source
Read More

Hyping Artificial Intelligence with Seductive Optics and the Frankenstein Complex

Artificial Intelligence, Boris Karloff, Buddhist monks, Diane Ackerman, eye contact, Frankenstein, Frankenstein Complex, Goddess of Mercy, Kannon, Mary Shelley, Mindar, Neuroscience & Mind, News Media, packaging, regression curve, robots, seductive optics, seductive semantics, Sophia the Robot, Technology, Thomas Edison, uncanny valley, Victor Frankenstein, YouTube videos
Some of the panicky AI-will-take-over-the-world talk grows out of seductive optics — that is, the AI packaging. Source
Read More

Marks: Non-Computable You Won’t Achieve Immortality Through an AI Machine

Alan Turing, algorithms, Baylor University, Church-Turing Thesis, computation, computer science, computers, consciousness, Creativity, Dallas Conference on Science and Faith, emotion, faith, Faith & Science, future, human exceptionalism, humans, immortality, Intelligent Design, machines, mathematicians, Neuroscience & Mind, Non-Computable You, qualia, Ray Kurzweil, Robert J. Marks, sentience, Singularity, speed, spirituality, Turing Machine, understanding, William Dembski
Dreams of achieving immortality by having your consciousness uploaded, merging man and computer in the predicted 2045 “Singularity,” are just that — dreams. Source
Read More