Quantum Mechanical consequences for AI

[Sithdarth]

I will preface this by saying that this is not about how quantum mechanics might someday allow us to make an AI. This is about the consequences that might arise from an AI making observations.

To start with we must rehash Schroedinger's Cat. We probably all know about the cat in the box with the poison in a supposition of released and not released making the cat alive and dead. Now Schroedinger himself sidestepped the paradox by saying the cat as a conscious being was perfectly capable of collapsing the wave function for the entire universe. The cat in effect determined its own reality and was never in a supposition. That is to say there is something about a "conscious" mind that directly impacts reality in a way that anyone else can clearly see.

The Quantum Eraser Experiment and The Delayed Choice Quantum Eraser Experiment show us that even an observation by a non-conscious observation will also collapse the wave function but if that information is removed the wave function goes back to normal. In fact it can even retroactively return to normal. That is the effect propagates backward in time.

The combination of these two things is the real problem. If a conscious observer looks at the path information before it gets erased then that information now exists in their head. That information can then not be erased unless it is also erased from the observer's memories and the wave function remains collapsed.

Now we have two real possibilities from here. The first is that it is just hard to erase the information from a mind but once done the wave function would return to normal. One potential way this could work has to do with entropy changes included in the production and storage of information. This of course means there is nothing special about conscious observation beyond the way in which the information is stored. There is a certain attractiveness to this in that it removes all life from any place of importance. It does still allow for a definition of consciousness as any system in which there is a certain level of difficulty in erasing information to the point of reverting a wave function. Anything with a difficulty level above a certain threshold is conscious and anything below is not. Finding that threshold might be hard and might exclude or include somethings that are problematic. Like plants might be able to collapse a wave function to the point were reversing it is hard enough to be called conscious. If it is related to entropy changes we could actually have a mathematical formula to predict the exact point where the entropic changes do to information flow in a system produce consciousness.

The second is that there is something inherently different about "consciousness". Which I personally dislike in that it sounds a little hooky and it seems to me to violate Occam's Razor. It's something that cannot be measured and makes no predictions. Like the first one it allows for a both a definition of consciousness and a surefire test to determine consciousness. Of course you could still end up with things that you are uncomfortable with being defined as conscious. Also, if there is something special about consciousness the question becomes is it intrinsic to biology or could computers actually become conscious. If they can't then its intrinsic to biology which makes it an even stranger metaphysical concept. If they can it poses the opposite question. That is if consciousness is special but both machines and living things of sufficient complexity can have it then what the heck is it and how was it imbued in the machine if we accept that consciousness would arise gradually with increased complexity. (That is as it did with life.)

In either case instead of subjecting an AI to a Turing test you could instead incorporate it into a delayed choice quantum eraser experiment and then delete all its memory before anyone looks at it or the experimental data. If the interference reappears your AI is not conscious if it doesn't then it is conscious. You have used quantum mechanics to prove the existence of another mind and effectively countered solipsism. Of course if machines can't become conscious there are interesting implications. Like say machines can't be conscious but you can still transfer an entire mind into one. Then what becomes of the mind even if it can still pass a Turing test. Worse yet if the universe evolves to the point where only this artificial life remains what happens to causality when any collapsed wave function can revert if everyone that saw it or the consequences of it forgets about it? Alternatively, if machines can't be conscious you might not be able to transfer a mind into them. It also raises questions about maybe the universe evolved in specifically the right ways to create conscious observers or maybe the first life to evolve retroactively fixed the history of the universe the instant it attained consciousness.

In short something really weird seems to be going on here and I'm sure there is a great Scifi story hidden in their somewhere.

[Magus]

Does this have something to do with why a watched pot never boils?

[Sithdarth]

Does this have something to do with why a watched pot never boils?

Quite possibly.That's more to do with subjective time measurement via the workings of your internal clock.

[Magus]

I'll be slightly serious and expose my complete lack of knowledge of quantum mechanics: 1. how do we know that time isn't a completely subjective illusion of the human mind, simply a measuring device rather than a "thing", and 2. why does observing photons change how they would have reacted had they not been observed, unless it's in an actual thing that actually manipulates the photons and I'm misreading "observe" as "me looking at something" when it's actually "people looking at things in a special device that lets them look at them and which actually acts on them in some fashion."

EDIT: I think I might have answered my own question since the quantum eraser experiment involves shooting light through a crystal at least, right? Or photons or whatever.

[BitVyper]

It's something that cannot be measured and makes no predictions.

What if you can figure out and define what it is about consciousness that is inherently different?

Out of curiousity, would you consider a computer that developed consciousness gradually in response to external stimuli (like those little robot communities they made on the basis of finding food and avoiding poison, but with actual consciousness) less artificial than one that could be programmed so from the start?

[Geminex]

1. how do we know that time isn't a completely subjective illusion of the human mind, simply a measuring device rather than a "thing"

I guess we could assume that. But it wouldn't be fun. Also, you couldn't use that assumption to blow up cities or build AI.
Killjoy.

2. why does observing photons change how they would have reacted had they not been observed, unless it's in an actual thing that actually manipulates the photons and I'm misreading "observe" as "me looking at something" when it's actually "people looking at things in a special device that lets them look at them and which actually acts on them in some fashion."

The entire principle of quantum mechanics is that we change things by knowing. Even if the method by which we observe it doesn't affect whatever we're observing, the fact that we're observing it does.

Edit: Also, I hate Sith. Before this I was trying to think of more global warming puns. Now I'm busy comprehending that (simply put) information can time-travel. I'll get back to you on the AI issue.

[Magus]

Originally Posted by Geminex

The entire principle of quantum mechanics is that we change things by knowing. Even if the method by which we observe it doesn't affect whatever we're observing, the fact that we're observing it does.

But why? What "energy" or "force" is acting on it to change it? People aren't psychic, after all. Observation acts on the observer, not the observed. When we look at a star our eyes are catching light from billions of light years away; how is that thing which is affecting our biology instead affecting it? Why does knowing change it? What "force" is at work?

Unless it's like a multiverse thing or something (pretty sure quantum mechanics has multiverse in it, right?)

[Geminex]

It's not so much energy or force as it is... probability.

When an "Either Or" situation occurs on a quantum (that is to say, extremely small, tiniest-things-in-existence-small) level, such as a photon of light nearing a sheet of paper with two closely-placed slits in it, then the result will usually be a combination of both "Either" and "Or".
For the photon going through the slits, if it isn't observed, this'll mean that, contrary to all expectations, it'll go through both slits. Simultaneously. And then it'll interact with itself.

If, on the other hand, we observe it, and find a way to determine which slit it went through, it only goes through one slit, and, thusly, doesn't interact with itself.
The reason for this is that the photon's pretty much a particle and a wave (a probability function) at the same time.

And that's just the basic principle. One of the experiments that Sith's posted above proves that not only does observing the experiment change the result, but it will change the result retroactively. Pretty much, if you're going to observe it, then the result you get will be the result you would have gotten through observing it, even if you haven't actually observed it yet.

Apparently, information can fucking time travel.
Because fuck you, Einstein.

[Sithdarth]

But why? What "energy" or "force" is acting on it to change it? People aren't psychic, after all. Observation acts on the observer, not the observed. When we look at a star our eyes are catching light from billions of light years away; how is that thing which is affecting our biology instead affecting it? Why does knowing change it? What "force" is at work?

To give you a simple but probably unsatisfying explanation it all comes down to the uncertainty principle. You see there is a set of classical uncertainty equations that relate the various measures of a wave to other measures of a wave. Like wave number and extent in space and frequency and duration of the pulse. These uncertainty equations put a limit on how well you can know one of these quantities depending on how well you know the other. Perhaps a better way to say it is that if a wave packet is packed into a very short distance it will have a very large number of different wave numbers (which are related to wavelength) and a wave packet with a very short duration in time will have a large number of different frequencies. This is just a consequence of how waves work. The mechanics behind waves just mean this happens.

In quantum mechanics everything is both wave and particle so as one might expect these uncertainty relations come into play but in slightly different forms. But again the minimum uncertainty exists simply because that is how Quantum Mechanics works and has nothing at all to do with how you observe the waves. It is these uncertainties that "collapse" when you observe a system. You can find the position but then the momentum goes crazy and vice versa. There is no special thing happening here its just how the mathematics that describes Quantum Mechanics works out and damned if the universe doesn't obey the math just to foil our understanding of what the hell is going on.

Also, I'm really damn tired so please forgive any really strange typos. Like I found some really crazy ones on my last read through and I don't trust myself to have found them all.

[Ryanderman]

Re the OP: You said that:

It does still allow for a definition of consciousness as any system in which there is a certain level of difficulty in erasing information to the point of reverting a wave function. Anything with a difficulty level above a certain threshold is conscious and anything below is not. Finding that threshold might be hard and might exclude or include somethings that are problematic.

And also that:

In either case instead of subjecting an AI to a Turing test you could instead incorporate it into a delayed choice quantum eraser experiment and then delete all its memory before anyone looks at it or the experimental data. If the interference reappears your AI is not conscious if it doesn't then it is conscious.

Maybe I'm missing it, but what sets the threshold of difficulty to determine conciousness above the difficulty of erasing an AI's memory, and below the difficulty of erasing a human's memory?