Robots, Can They Take Over?

ROBOTS, CAN THEY TAKE OVER?

Movie Examples

A common theme in the movies is the robot with the capacity to think and feel emotions.
The theme of Artificial Intelligence, for instance, is a robot who wants a heart.

http://www.flipsidemovies.com/ai.html: A.I. presents us with a future at once wondrous and grim. The polar ice caps have melted, drowning the world's coastlines and putting cities like New York and Venice under water. Yet humanity has thrived thanks to careful population control and an increasing reliance on intelligent robots whose self-reliance keeps them from consuming precious resources. As the film opens, one of the world's leading scientists proposes a radical advancement in artificial intelligence. He intends to create a robot with the capacity to love.

Then there is the recent release, I Robot, where a robot cares enough to save the day.

http://www.irobotmovie.com/: [The movie] features robots who handle all of life's most mundane chores. Cooking, cleaning, balancing checkbooks, walking dogs, answering phones, going to the restroom. Humans are now free to enjoy life without the normal little everyday stresses. Best of all, robots do not commit crimes. Suspicion immediately falls on Sonny, a very specialized robot who claims to dream and exhibits emotions.

And in the past, even the tin man in Wizard of Oz, who wanted a heart, and GOT one, echoes this theme.

http://www.filmsite.org/wiza.html: The Tin Woodsman clanks, squeaks, tilts from side to side, and bangs his way through a song and dance routine to explain his problem and need for a heart in "If I Only Had a Heart."

When a man's an empty kettle, He should be on his mettle
And yet I'm torn apart. Just because I'm presumin'
That I could be kind of human. If I only had a heart

I'd be tender, I'd be gentle, And awful sentimental
Regarding love and art, I'd be friends with the sparrows
And the boy that shoots the arrows, If I only had a heart...

The Stepford Wives were not only beautiful, they always had dinner on the table and never argued with their husbands.

http://www.netflix.com/MovieDisplay?: Joanna and her husband Walter begin to suspect there's something radically wrong with their neighbors after the couple moves to the beautiful suburb of Stepford. With the single exception of their alcohol-swilling new friend Bobbie, all the Stepford wives seem to act, well, robotic. Are the husbands replacing their real wives with sexually compliant cyborg copies? And who might be next?

Then there is the Terminator, clever enough to mimic humans and extract information from human witnesses and conduct a manhunt that would put the FBI to shame.

http://www.movieprop.com/tvandmovie/terminator/theterminator.htm: The Terminator is a metallic robotic machine enclosed in living human tissue and built by a computer network named Skynet. The Terminator movie is unique in that the star of the film, is a murderous machine. Terminator's breathe, bleed, and can even have bad breathe. They are used in the future to infilitrate human hideouts within the Earth. Radiation and extermination camps by the machines had nearly wiped man from the face of the planet.

R2D2 and C3PO in Star Wars are loyal, disobey orders from humans when it's called for, and when R2D2 is smashed up, C3PO volunteers some of his parts if it will make a difference in repairing his friend.

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2002/coming.attractions/stories/star.wars/: A blue-and-white astro droid, R2-D2, also known as Artoo, first entered the Star Wars saga as a droid upon Naboo Queen Padme Amidala's royal starship. He was aboard the starship when it landed on the desert planet of Tatooine for repairs and it was there he met C3PO, a homemade droid with whom he struck up a friendship.

Built by a 9-year-old Anakin Skywalker to help his mother, C3PO stayed on Tatooine when Anakin left with Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn. The two were reunited [later] as both were in service to the royal family of the planet Alderaan. C3PO and R2D2 returned to Tatooine to complete Princess Leia's mission to find Obi-Wan Kenobi and give him the plans of the Empire's Death Star weapon.

Does this happen in reality, that robots compute mentally as well as intelligent life forms, and have emotions?

ZetaTalk: Thinking Machines, written Aug 15, 1995.: A goal of research scientists is to create robots so effective at running matters that all of mankind in essence becomes akin to the upper class - waited on hand and foot. To be effective in these roles, robots would have to repair and reproduce themselves, or each other, i.e. propagate; be able to adapt to changing circumstances, i.e. learn; and, since mankind can't be bothered, make logical determinations, i.e. think. Standing between the robot and sentient life forms, then, lies only emotion - hopes, caring, desire, rage - the motivators. In pursuit of this dream servant, scientists are casting a jealous eye on biological elements, which can propagate, learn, and think.

But biological elements invariably carry the capacity for emotions. Even the amoebae reacts to defend itself, to escape, and moves toward that which it desires. Where is the line to be drawn? Do we, the Zetas, not use a massive computer for data storage and communication between alien groups in the Service-to-Other orientation, and does this computer not use biological components? We equate this to your use of wood and leather, as the biological elements we use are not alive. They cannot propagate, nor do they move to defend themselves or move toward that which they desire. They do not have desire. They are dead. This is the ethical guidelines we use in creating robots, but these are not simply guidelines we have determined among ourselves.

The Council of Worlds, which oversees all situations where one intelligent life form can enslave another, forbids the use of living biological material as components of thinking machines. The robot that propagates, learns, thinks, and as all life has emotion is alive, yet enslaved, as controls would surely be put into place to prevent the servant class from arising. Thus, media scenarios such as The Stedford Wives, or The Terminator, or Star Trek's Data would not be allowed to develop, not even if scientists managed to develop them, which is far from likely. That those [on Earth], who are emerging souls in the process of determining a spiritual orientation, would attempt to do so is one of the reasons for limiting [their] capabilities. Mankind, in short, is too dumb to create a handy-dandy version of intelligent, sentient life. One, per their desires, which would never break down or talk back, would always look good, be compliant in bed, foresee one's needs, repair the car, be infinitely loyal, smart as a whip but never look down on the master, and never suffer from neglect. The child's dream.

Telepathic Computers

The Zetas, in fact, report they use organic components in their computers.

ZetaTalk: Sky Computer, written by Jul 15, 1995.: We, the Service-to-Other Zetas, utilize a computer which communicates to ourselves and is receptive to our thoughts. This computer is tapped by others, besides ourselves, too, as our brethren so access it. The computer technology would not be understood by your Earth scientists, who expect computers to operate by electrical pathways, carried by metal wires or glass fibers, carried or held in various media that are inorganic. Our computers utilize organic materials. This does not make them robots, nor sentient. You also use organic materials, in your shoes, your belts, your shirts, your salad bowls, etc.

A computer that is receptive to telepathy?
Yes, and the proof of this in UFOlogy lore is the Crash at Kecksburg.

ZetaTalk: Crash at Kecksburg, written on Jun 15, 1996: Among the many fraudulent stories about crashed ships in the possession of the military are some stories that seem real. The local populace makes numerous observations, and there are tell-tale signs that remain for the curious explorer to see long afterwards. Well, in these situations, something is going on, it's just that it's not of an alien origin! As a result of their early agreement with aliens in the Service-to- Self, the military got possession of several ships. This is certainly no secret, as Bob Lazar confirmed the rumors. The military has never figured out how to operate the ships they were given, and many deaths have resulted from their attempts. Unlike human vehicles, which have a propulsion system and manual controls, alien ships house a strange device that cannot be examined and MENTAL controls. The device that supports density switching and rapid transport from one part of the Universe to another cannot be opened and examined, as it explodes and disintegrates when this is attempted.

Of course, the scientists ordered to proceed with such an experiment died instantly. In time, the decision was made to simply use the ships, and to stop trying to understand how they worked. The fact that the alien ships required mental control only momentarily stopped the generals who wanted desperately to control such a device. They drilled the smug Service-to-Self aliens assigned as an escort without end, and returned for more lessons after every abortive attempt. The stories told of furtive observations at Area 51, where wobbly space ships were seen lifting a few feet off the ground and then flopping back, are true.

Eventually enough control was attained that the ambitious generals would order a field run with this ship or that. The idea was to do more with the ship than simply lift and wobble about. They wanted rapid travel across the skies. They wanted to impress the heck out of anyone they were interested in intimidating. At least they could do that, they reasoned. So the human pilots, selected for their confidence and demonstrated skill, would aim a little higher, a little farther, and WHAM! The crash remains, which might be found anywhere, would be quickly collected by special military teams scrambled with the greatest haste. The most likely excuse would be given to the media and local authorities, and since the crash site is always thoroughly cleansed, countering this story is difficult.

If the space ship is operated by controls that are receptive to human or alien telepathy, then surely this is live tissue, brain tissue!
Is this similar to what has been represented in such movies as the Manchurian Candidate?

http://www.allmovie.com/cg/avg.dll?p=avg&sql=A31268: While on patrol, Shaw and his platoon are ambushed by Korean troops. Months later, Shaw is receiving a hero's welcome as he returns to the United States to accept the Congressional Medal of Honor, and several of the soldiers who served under Shaw repeatedly refer to him as "the bravest, finest, most lovable man I ever met." It soon becomes evident that after their capture by the Koreans, Shaw and his men were subjected to an intense program of brainwashing prior to their release. While several are troubled by bad dreams and inexplicable behavior, it's Capt. Bennett Marco who seems the most haunted by the experience. In time, Marco is able to piece together what happened; it seems Raymond Shaw was programmed by a shadowy cadre of Russian and Chinese agents into a killing machine who will assassinate anyone, even a close friend, when given the proper commands.

Just like the space ship, the human weapon waits for a command and complies!
But is it possible to program humans in this manner?
Controlling humans, via telepathy, despite the stories and the movies, simply does not happen.

ZetaTalk: Mind Control, written on May 15, 1996: The dream of all controlling individuals, a category which includes the military hierarchy, is to create virtual robots out of the population at the flip of a switch. Riot control, preventing resistance, silencing dissent, ensuring complete adherence to orders or edicts - such are the heady goals of those who are control oriented. Humans use drugs, physical restraints, and threats and bribes to gain these ends, but none of these methods are fail-safe. In human-to-human encounters no one is paralyzed unless drugs or physical restraints are used, and likewise leaving a memory only in the subconscious where it can act like a post-hypnotic suggestion is achievable only by battering and splintering the conscious through trauma and drugs.

The secret government, which in the early days was heavily influenced by the CIA, longed to master what they considered to be mind control techniques. In fact, a human cannot be given a hypnotic suggestion they are not in accordance with, and during [our] visitations the human is in control and can terminate contact at any time simply by willing it to be so. Even [our use of] the paralyzed state, which makes use of an old portion of the human brain that is akin to a possum's brain, can be broken at will by the human. Nevertheless, the CIA did a considerable amount of casting about, trying to discover how aliens were able to paralyze humans and plant what they assumed to be post hypnotic suggestions. Needless to say, they did not succeed, but their fervor and rumors of this activity inspired such stories as the Manchurian Candidate, where humans, while unaware, are time bombs waiting to become absolute robots behaving in a preprogrammed manner. This is all so far from what is possible as to be positively silly.

With the human mind, there is too much play, the brain is too complex, tentacles running in every direction into memories and plans, too many factors to be controlled.
As it has its own agenda well ahead of any programming being inserted, the programming is superficial and discarded.
I've had my telepathic center enhanced, in order to do ZetaTalk, and have experimented with remote viewing too.
It works.
I found that if I had a number of factors in my search, for instance the month of June, picnic basket and all the fixings, and family tensions or arguments, I could locate a person thinking about such a picnic, where just thinking about picnic fixings alone might not locate that person.
To me, it was something like tuning a radio, finding the station by turning the dial.
I assumed brain waves were involved.
Our memory, in our brains, is simply chemical pathways, according to our human scientists.
But just how organic materials receptive to telepathy might be programmed in robots is a mistery, as in humans, telepathy is so connected to distractions in the human brain and body!

ZetaTalk: Telepathy, written on Dec 15, 2002: Telepathy is both specific and general. As someone who has telepathic ability can tell you, it can also be voluntary or visited upon one. We will use the analogy of a radio, which can be tuned to various radio frequencies or turned off entirely. A radio also requires a broadcasting station, from which many radios as receivers can listen. Radio waves go long distances, as do the brain waves responsible for what humans call telepathy. If someone with telepathy ability can receive, theoretically, from all broadcasting brains, how to the receiving brain sort it all out, and not get overwhelmed? The receiving brains are in essence busy with their own business, so the incoming is treated as noise in the main. Where the incoming strikes a cord with the receiving brain, such as a familiar scene or mutual concerns, the receiving brain may decide to listen.

When this occurs, it is as though the dial on the radio were being turned, and the volume turned up likewise. The receiver concentrates on the inbound signals, not allowing itself to be distracted by internal concerns of the self. Thus, a telepathic person in listening mode may seem distracted, though other functions can proceed. In tune with the inbound message, the receiver's heart will beat in tune with the sender, and their brain be activated in similar places, so they are acting as much as possible as a single brain. During these modes, it is possible for the receiver to start sending, as they are in sync, on the same wave length, so to speak. In general, and to a high degree, telepathy is something your DNA supports. Be aware that only a small segment of humankind can utilize telepathy to any degree. A small percentage of the population has an occasional telepathic experience, rare, sometimes once in a lifetime. Of this small percentage, a smaller yet percentage, perhaps only 2% of the whole population, have any ability that they can muster at will. In that they share DNA, share brain wave hardware, so to speak, family connections are the most common. Twins and family also share experiences, which also increases occurrences.

Telepathy also occurs during sleep, highly common, which is why many humans conclude they have prophetic dreams. They are merely reaching out, during sleep, when they are breathing slowly and not highly oxygenated, and chatting with others who have knowledge. Prophecy is often simply a logical guess, based on many facts not generally known to the public. The prophet may be simply putting together information gained from many others, and arriving at the logical conclusion! Holding your breath, to increase Carbon Dioxide levels, helps, which is why the Hindus prefer mountain tops for meditation. Carbon Dioxide suppresses interference, noise, from other body and brain functions, so the body and brain is in essence drugged. Likewise, learning to trust your senses, if you think you are in contact, rather than reject them as silly thoughts, can help you make full use of what ability you have. Practice with some friends, and compare what you received with what they have sent or written down, to gain confidence.

I'm wondering if the Zetas and others who use that sky computer via telepathy are tuning their brains to send or receive in a certain brain wave frequency.
Maybe they also include an indentifier, indentifying themselves so anyone else reading that computer can know who sent the message.
If they use selective brain waves for certain messages, then the sky computer would be acting like one big radio station, and those picking up the message just tuning the dial!

Life vs Organic Material

Where is the line drawn between using sentient life and using organic material?
We replace a lost hand with an artificial limb, do organ transplants, we use wood and leather and horns from animals, and the newest computer technology is reported to use DNA for the logic components!

http://computer.howstuffworks.com/dna-computer1.htm: In 1994, Leonard Adleman introduced the idea of using DNA to solve complex mathematical problems. Adleman, a computer scientist at the University of Southern California, came to the conclusion that DNA had computational potential after reading the book "Molecular Biology of the Gene," written by James Watson, who co-discovered the structure of DNA in 1953. In fact, DNA is very similar to a computer hard drive in how it stores permanent information about your genes.

Using tissue like DNA or even potentially a smidge of brain tissue that can receive a telepathic communication does not constitute using a living creature, as life evolved naturally has many aspects that a tissue sample does not.
Life defends itself, seeks to feed and grow, has instinct for self preservation, becomes curious and explorative,
desires to master its environment.

Here's an example of very early life.
Something like a bacteria or single cell organism, that might be used in robotic controls.

Skepticism greets claim of possible alien microbes, Jan 5, 2006
http://www.world-science.net/exclusives/060104_specksfrm.htm: A paper to appear in a scientific journal claims a strange red rain might have dumped microbes from space onto Earth four years ago. At least 50,000 kg (55 tons) of the particles have fallen in all. People on the streets found their cloths stained by red raindrops. In a few places the concentration of particles were so great that the rainwater appeared almost like blood. The particles look like one-celled organisms and are about 4 to 10 thousandths of a millimeter wide, somewhat larger than typical bacteria. The particles seem to lack a nucleus, the core DNA-containing compartment that animal and plant cells have, the researchers wrote. Chemical tests indicated they also lacked DNA, the gene-carrying molecule that most types of cells contain.

The outer envelope seems to contain an inner capsule, which in some places appears to be detached from the outer wall to form an empty region inside the cell. Further, there appears to be a faintly visible mucus layer present on the outer side of the cell. The major constituents of the red particles are carbon and oxygen. Carbon is the key component of life on Earth. Silicon is most prominent among the minor constituents of the particles; other elements found were iron, sodium, aluminum and chlorine. The red rain phenomenon first started in Kerala after a meteor airburst event, which occurred on 25th July 2001. Alive or dead, the particles have some staying power, if the paper is correct. Even after storage in the original rainwater at room temperature without any preservative for about four years, no decay or discolouration of the particles could be found.

Could this single cell organism be used in robotic controls?
Perhaps as presented in this article, without DNA, the ability to replicate, as replication is something that would disrupt the programming a robot is intended to have.
The Zetas describe this process of early life.

ZetaTalk: Space Dust, Alive?, written Jan 6, 2006: Life, of course, is everywhere, as we have explained, emerging on diverse worlds, carbon or silicon based or emerging on worlds humans would consider too poisonous for life. Gaseous planets support life, on occasion, nor is DNA, per se, required. Crystals develop, start and grow, but are not considered life. Why? Because mobility is utterly lacking, and thus any ability for conscious thought as independence from the environment is not possible. A tree lacks mobility but is alive, because it reacts to attacks against itself by healing its wounds and seeks to perpetuate itself by leaning into the sunlight. Life defends itself, perpetuates itself, and seeks to grow by accumulation. With mobility comes intelligence, scarcely needed otherwise. With intelligence can come consciousness, the awareness of the self as distinct from other life. We have stated that life evolves naturally on many planets, those that can sustain life, and the numbers are far beyond what man imagines possible.

Some type of liquidity is invariably a necessity for the start of life, so the chemicals required can encounter each other. This may be a liquid or a gaseous state. That said, why would dust from a meteor appear to be alive, a form of life in any case, celular? Most of the meteors that sling past Earth are from the solar system, despite what human astronomers declare. As we have stated, comets, the dirty snowballs that outgas brilliantly as they round the Sun, are vestiges of a couple dozen planets that rode the Asteroid Belt in the past, water planets almost to a one, and lifebearing. The Asteroid Belt holds the majority of the magma from those planets, which burst into space and hardened into odd shapes. If life had begun, on all those planets, what stage of development were they in? Life, whether it evolves naturally or is seeding to expedite the process, does not develop in a day. It develops in steps and stages. One stage is in place before the next step can be taken. DNA supports the ability of life to replicate itself and carry forward the dictates of biological function. Since man comes late to examining his own beginnings, he cannot determine if DNA arrived before the cell, or the cell was in place before the DNA.

The assumption is that DNA came first, links forming in some kind of primordial soup, and the cell developed later as a protective device. Now, they know otherwise. DNA in a soup would be subject to assault, continually, and thus not perpetuate itself with any certainty. Life does not develop in chaos, but rather where a soup with rich ingredients exist. Complex molecules form in nature, as an example, the petrochemicals that form over the heat of volcanoes, or during lightning storms. The cell body does not dissipate without DNA, as human scientists know. It feeds, and continues. It does this without assistance, as long as the soup it finds itself in allowed growth. Death of a cell occurs only when it is attacked, exposed to attack, so that the molecular functions that allowed it to form and retain form are disrupted. The evidence dropped to Earth was encased in an asteroid chunk that protected the molecular composition of these cells from the formerly life bearing planets in the Asteroid Belt. They thus had no reason to die. But as the shape clearly presents, this was a stage of life prior to DNA insertion, the next stage. DNA naturally forming in primordial pools needs a nest, a shelter. With cells about, it can migrate through the skin of a cell to interior chambers, which it does today. Is this not what the virus does, when infecting a cell? Is this not what RNA does when it travels between cells, communicating?

So it appears that even these primordial cells might not be candidates for use in robots, as they would want to replicate.
Unless they were not given the nutrient soup they need, so they would have no urge to replicate.
Humm, certainly is complicated.

Choice, the Key Ingredient

A living creature, capable of consciousness, the realization that it is separate from others, requires a brain that has a high enough IQ to entertain this concept.
Per the dictionary, consciousness is:

con·scious·ness
A sense of one's personal or collective identity, including the attitudes, beliefs, and sensitivities held by or considered characteristic of an individual or group. An alert cognitive state in which you are aware of yourself and your situation; self, ego - the consciousness of your own identity.

One must have enough gray matter to realize the self is separate from others, thus.
To be sentient, emotional, requires hormones and the programming of reactions such as flight or flight.
Per the dictionary, being sentient is:

sen·tient
Experiencing sensation or feeling. Endowed with feeling and unstructured consciousness. Consciously perceiving; knowing and perceiving; having awareness of surroundings and sensations and thoughts;

Outside of instinct and in some cases based on their genetics, living creatures are also not programmed, but begin their programming at birth, when they can make choices and interact with their environment.
Per the dictionary, choice involves:

choice
The power, right, or liberty to choose; an option.
The act, power, or right of choosing. Choice implies broadly the freedom to choose from a set:
Option often stresses a power or liberty to choose that has been granted:
Preference indicates choice based on one's values, bias, or predilections:
Selection suggests a variety of things or persons to choose from:
Election especially emphasizes the use of judgment:

But can't a robot be programmed to have a set of options, and programmed on the method to sort through the options, thus, have choice?

ZetaTalk: Lack of Choice, written May 15, 1997.: To humans, who observe that their computers often seem more intelligent than other humans, our assertion that the rules we must observe regarding sentient or conscious thinking machines prevent our machines from becoming alive must seem confusing. A retarded human who can barely recall the sequences necessary to put one leg into a set of trousers is alive and conscious, but a powerful computer monitoring a myriad of logic threads simultaneously is not. Just how does that compute! The difference is subtle, and where the line may seem blurred to humans who are confusing performance with intrinsic intellectual independence. i.e. choice, the issue is not confusing to us. We will expand on the differences between performance and choice.Quite often, and in fact most often in machines developed in higher densities, the performance of the machine is superior to the performance a life form could attain. This should not be surprising in that the machine was developed for this reason - because the life form desired more rapid or reliable performance than they could attain, or tired of the redundant activity required when the life form itself was performing the activity. This is precisely why humans invented computers, which at first did simple calculations rapidly and with almost unerring accuracy. This is still why humans press for faster speed and the ability to handle more complex calculations, as the computer allows for insights requiring the processing of immense amounts of data, or rapid analysis of the data for on-the-spot decisions. Nevertheless, the computer is performing as its masters directed.

[Souls] form in the life forms that DNA makes possible not because there is activity, which in any case takes place in a swirling nebula, but because of the possibility for choice. The readership can relate to this if they think of common situations they themselves face almost daily. They rise in the morning. In this they have a choice, as they can choose not to rise, to sleep on for more minutes or hours, to refuse to rise ever until they die in bed, to engage in all manner of activities in bed from affectionate or sexual interchanges with their mate to reading or masturbation or simply scratching. In all of this the choice is theirs. Now imagine that one was required to rise automatically, no choice, and proceed through a regimen of steps such as tooth brushing and dressing in a pre-defined outfit, every day, day after day, without any foreseeable change. Too boring! Humans have been known to kill themselves due to unrelenting boredom, and forming entities simply do not incarnate into such situations.

Machines are not intelligent as in being capable of thought, they are simply well programmed and capable of adaptive reasoning. Where this differs from the free choice that DNA that has evolved into complex organisms can sustain, is in the degree to which the initial programming dictates the outcome of conclusions. Machines adapt to the environment, but always within the dictates of their initial programming. Living organisms have multiple branches in their logic trees, in that these branches can be grown in response to the environment and past choices, where machines in fact do not have branches. What might be taken for a machines logic tree is in fact a predetermined branch dictated by the initial program. Thus, the rule that machines, no matter how complex, cannot carry incarnating souls is not one that needs enforcement. It happens quite naturally as the [stuff of souls] simply doesn't linger!

The busy human mind, uncontained and able to process all about it, include is history, ponder the missing pieces, an hardly be called a robot or even a robot potential.
Because choice is there, the capacity to chose and not simply be programmed.

Artificial Intelligence

Yet we hear from the computer field, that artificial intelligence is programming a computer to be able to THINK, to learn from its mistakes, and to create new branches in the plethora of choices available to it!

http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/A/artificial_intelligence.html: Artificial Intelligence is the branch of computer science concerned with making computers behave like humans. The term was coined in 1956 by John McCarthy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Artificial intelligence includes
# programming computers to play games such as chess and checkers
# programming computers to make decisions in real-life situations (for example, some expert systems help doctors diagnose diseases based on symptoms)
# programming computers to understand natural human languages
# attempting to reproduce the types of physical connections that occur in animal brains
# programming computers to see and hear and react to other sensory stimuli

Currently, no computers exhibit full artificial intelligence (that is, are able to simulate human behavior). The greatest advances have occurred in the field of games playing. The best computer chess programs are now capable of beating humans. In the area of robotics, computers are now widely used in assembly plants, but they are capable only of very limited tasks. Robots have great difficulty identifying objects based on appearance or feel, and they still move and handle objects clumsily. Natural-language processing offers the greatest potential rewards because it would allow people to interact with computers without needing any specialized knowledge. You could simply walk up to a computer and talk to it. Unfortunately, programming computers to understand natural languages has proved to be more difficult than originally thought.

Some rudimentary translation systems that translate from one human language to another are in existence, but they are not nearly as good as human translators. There are also voice recognition systems that can convert spoken sounds into written words, but they do not understand what they are writing; they simply take dictation. Even these systems are quite limited -- you must speak slowly and distinctly. In the early 1980s, expert systems were believed to represent the future of artificial intelligence and of computers in general. To date, however, they have not lived up to expectations. Many expert systems help human experts in such fields as medicine and engineering, but they are very expensive to produce and are helpful only in special situations. Today, the hottest area of artificial intelligence is neural networks, which are proving successful in a number of disciplines such as voice recognition and natural-language processing.

Artificial intelligence is getting closer to human thought and interactions.
Are we there yet?

ZetaTalk: Robots, written May 15, 1997.: Robots were first thought of during human development as workers, other humans. As in most [young] worlds, enslaving the other is a constant consideration, and this slavery takes many forms. Shackling the worker to his task and working him to death is the most obvious, but the shackles that are not obvious are still just as binding. The husband who cannot leave his wife without encountering a smothering monthly support bill will tolerate demands from his master just as a shackled slave would. Both cannot think of escape due to the pain it would bring. With the advent of programmable machines such as computers, the thought of having machines as slaves is irrepressible. They don't require wages, never demand a day off, and can be relied upon to be consistent and do what they were told to do! Such a cooperative slave. Programmed machinery is a natural occurrence in densities higher than [the Earth], and to a great degree. Where the passion to enslave another is not present in Service-to-Other communities, the desire for a silent and reliable teammate to help one do one's job better is more certainly ever present.

Robots are developed and used up to but not beyond the point where they could be considered sentient or conscious, as the Council of Worlds does not allow thinking machines, in essence biorobots, to be developed and enslaved by other intelligent species. The line is drawn where including the components of life would enter in - DNA capable of self initiated thought, emotion, and most particularly a conscious sense of the self as separate from the surroundings. Intelligent machines, no matter how remarkable, are always following their initial programming. Their ability to learn from circumstances inevitably follows this initial programming, and cannot unshackle itself from this. Robots are not constructed without programming, to form their own idea, so to speak, of what to do in this or that circumstance.

Such a master would be unleashing a monster, as the robot could conclude that the master should be eliminated, for instance. Thus, where the urge to have silent slaves is frequently present, the urge to allow them to decide their own tasks and purpose is never present. The complexity of DNA, which breaks from the original coding to mutate, and frequently, has the capacity to break from its original genetic programming. Only life, where the brain upon birth is unprogrammed, can sustain a truly original thought. Robots would be unreliable if allowed to mutate, and are thus never constructed in this manner. Robots also do not have the complexity that DNA sequences allow, as the very complexity allows for variance and unpredictability - the antithesis of the concept of a reliable mechanical and undemanding slave!

Bounds, Limits

Even for a game, or the game of chess, there are LIMITED choices.

http://chess.about.com/od/beginners/a/ble10ndx.htm: The Pawn can only move forward. It never moves sideways or backwards. The Knight is the piece with the trickiest move in chess. It moves one square in any direction then diagonally one square away from its starting square. The Rook can move any number of squares along its row or its column. The Bishop can move any number of squares along its diagonals. The Queen can move any number of squares along its row, its column, or its diagonals. The Queen combines the chess moves of the Rook and the Bishop. This makes it the most powerful piece on the board. The King has the simplest move in chess. It can go one square in any direction.

The game of chess is bounded by the possible moves.
As a former computer programmer, let me list a few of them.

For every move the opponent makes, the chess player, whether human or robotic, plays forward the outcome of every possible move.
The odds, of losing a valuable piece, or cornering a valuable piece belonging to the opponent, are calculated.
Computers calculate this type of thing very well, its simple logic.
If I move here, I lose this piece, ergo, that move is disqualified.
If I move there, I capture the opponents piece, ergo, this move is listed and weighted in the list as a possible good next move.
If I move there, I capture the King of my opponent, this gets the top weight in the list.
Arrange the board for every possible move and play forward what the opponent might do with that setting.
Weight the possible moves to be made based on the possible outcome.
Search through the available stunning/quickdeath type moves known in chess to see if they apply, when overlaid over the current board setting.
If the quickdeath type move on the programs part is possible, play forward to see if the opponent can counter this and achieve a checkmate.
If yes, scrap the quickdeath move.
Then take the move at the top of the list, with the most weight, as the best choice.

So you see, it is a bounded situation, only so many possibilities, although lightning fast by a computer, and not distracted as the human can certainly be.

And even if the computer is programmed to ADD choices, add program code to itself, it is still somewhat limited because it started out with a limited number of choices.
It may understand the numbers or letters you are typing into the keyboard, but it is not reading your body language, for instance.
They are, in the words of the Zetas, bounded.

ZetaTalk: Bounded Robots, written Jul 15, 1997.: Confusion over whether robots are alive, make choices, or might be incarnated with spirits lies in understanding what is seen versus what is unseen on the surface. On the surface, humans see robots able to entertain focus on a task at hand to the exclusion of all possible distractions, and thus, for instance, win at a game of chess over a human chess master. Is the robot not thinking? Yes and no, depending upon how one classifies thought. To primitive peoples, a simple computer program appears to be thinking, as it can rapidly arrive at a conclusion while entertaining a problem it has been programmed to address. Computer programs are not considered brains by most humans only because they can gaze at and understand the program, and can see that the computer is simply following instructions. What is seen in robots versus humans is that:

1. Robots can go places humans cannot, such as the surface of Mars or the outer reaches of the Solar System.
2. Robots can concentrate on a bounded task, such as a game of chess, far better than humans.
3. Robots can operate without attention or direction from their human masters.
4. Humans get distracted by their biological needs.
5. Humans can have intractable prejudices or cultural viewpoints that they refuse to drop.

What is unseen is that robots are bounded in ways that DNA is not bounded. Humans are bounded by their biology, an inability to put aside their biological needs, so that they cannot travel where robots can, exclusively concentrate on a task as robots can, or remain calm in disturbing circumstances such as a burning building or the torture of another human might present. In overcoming biological imperatives, robots seem superior, especially since the average human does not understand how they have been programmed and are in awe. Robots, however, are bounded in what they can address. Even where robots are designed to repair themselves and make minor adjustments to their surroundings, they are still operating within their original programming.

Humans see their DNA in light of its limitations, an upper limit on IQ, on the speed an athlete can sustain, or on longevity. They see the end result of decisions as limited because the human can only maneuver about in their natural habitat, so the complexity of what went into decision making is not apparent. What is unseen is the spiritual struggle, the pondering of the workings of the Universe, or the multiplicity of factors that go into a single decision to walk down the street or stay in the house! A robot arrives at its decision quickly because it does not ponder. Humans are virtually unlimited in their ability to ponder, which is what makes their life form attractive to the stuff of souls so that [souls] form within humans. Robots are utterly boring, as they have an inability to ponder, being programmed to reach quick conclusions after considering a set number of variables, and thus do not attract the stuff of souls, regardless of appearances!