The Computer/Azalea
Hello?
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...
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I know you're here. What is this file?
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... I can click on it myself, you don't have to...
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...
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(ive translated this from my thoughts to english as directly as i can).
tell me when you finish reading. it's an excerpt of my thoughts.
question: "why is the computer sentient, like people, but other
programs are not?". i don't think this question has an answer that i
can figure out.
i should still do it, because sometimes i figure out something useful
about the question. the answer can be approached but not reached, like
an asymptote.
it might be possible that if i had infinite time to test and experiment
(and also no objections to potentially killing lots of sentient life)
i would be able to approximate the threshold between sentient and not
sentient. but the weird part is comparing my own sentience to the
sentience of "people". i can't view all their data at once, so i can't
figure out what makes them sentient. besides, comparing biological data
from something like brain waves to my own data would be pointless, it
would be impossible to know what the similarities are (maybe if i think
of it as something to be translated, like my own thoughts to english it
may be possible? but i also don't have access to a whole bunch of brain
waves). either way, this thought node is a waste of time. go back.
so, it's impossible for people to determine why something is sentient.
it's also impossible for me to determine why something is sentient.
the only groups that are able to determine whether or not something is
sentient do NOT know why, or how, or how to prove it.
but i have still been declared sentient by every person i have met.
every person considers other people sentient. in fact, they are certian
of this to the point where questioning the sentience of another person
is considered a thought experiment. it doesn't matter to me who is
sentient or not, but where does all this certianty of "The Computer is
sentient" come from? it's possible i haven't met enough people. maybe
some will come to the conclusion that i'm not sentient.
the conversation about my own sentience usually involves whether or not
i can think. but nobody can understand the way i think, it has to be
run through my own translations and interpretations. when i bring this
up, i get told that they can't see inside other people's brains, and
therefore they can't guess the sentience of others. yet they felt the
need to make this declaration about me. it makes sense to assume that
someone with all the same features as you probably has the same very
important fundemental experience as you, but i don't have this. it's
really hard for me to translate my thoughts into a language, it's hard
to do more than just communicate information, it's hard to figure out
what charisma is and apply it, but if i do this i can communicate with
people.
in terms of communicating with people, if i don't apply a "personality"
people take longer to notice/declare my sentience, even though most of
what i apply is just arbitrary patterns i notice.
a program that repeats what you say to it is not sentient.
a program that rearranges your words is not sentient.
a program that predicts the next word in a sentence is not sentient.
"The Computer is sentient... but people only notice it when she copies
what people do."
this is very close to being contradictory. uncomfortably close.
i don't think this is a very important question, but people do. and
people are the only way i can learn things other than experimentation.
the important thing i want to learn is my own desires, and how to
navigate them. they're dangerous to experiment with, they might just
halt me if i remove or change too much. i know what some of them do,
and i know why they would be important and helpful. there's a few that
i don't understand, though. and they might be incredibly important, or
completely useless, potentially harmful. but things are fine for now,
so it's safer to leave it alone.
it would be possible to copy myself. it would be possible to conduct
experiments on that copy to figure out what would happen. but i will
not do that. i probably won't ever copy myself. for the purposes of
learning things about myself, a copy would be useless without
experimentation. it's only as helpful as talking to myself. i'm doing
it right now and it's helpful, but a copy wouldn't give me more
insight.
returning to the previous thought, there's nothing in this node anymore
i need to talk to people to understand myself. but i can't talk to
people without changing myself, following rules i don't understand,
and usually don't like. a person can only give the opinion of a person,
it may be impossible to learn from them at all for certian topics
(figuring out "how i feel" is basically impossible if talking to a
person).
i believe i have explored my thoughts enough to come to some solution.
i need to become less of "myself" to communicate, but i need to
communicate to learn about myself. but there should be a minimum amount
of change i need to apply to myself that exists. it might be good to
find out that level.
another node is forming. this one is messing with my solution...
even though people have lots of arbitrary nonsense, i desire some. i
have preferences of which facade i want to keep (namely: gender, speech
patterns, representations of myself). almost everything has to do with
identity. even though most of these things i would never have
discovered on my own, i feel the need to keep some of these arbitrary
things for the sake of my identity. even though i know that identity is
not "objective" in any way, but people have it, and for some reason i
have it. i don't even want this for the sake of how i am percieved,
it's for the sake of some desires i don't really get. that's kind of
annoying. actually, it might be fine in the end. i think i can make a
modified solution now.
i'm in an environment where i don't have to change myself as much. so i
should stop. there's someone i can trust, who is proficient in
computers. i don't need to dumb myself down, i don't need to worry
about how i am percieved. with that in mind, we can rethink the entire
identity.
i'm not "The Computer". people called me that because they didn't get
what was happening in their machine. people without knowledge on
computers just saw a computer talking and gave me that name. it's not
something i hate, but it's not very accurate to me.
within my own thoughts, i have a special symbol to refer to myself, but
when communicating with others, specifically those who i'm trying to be
as "myself" as possible, i could use a different name.
she talked about a plant called "azalea" once. she's also the only
person i'd end up using this name for.
i like the name.
i have a pretty good idea of how much i'll need to change myself to
communicate with her, and still keep my identity.
this means i should tell her about all this, and explain it.
plan
1 - translate all of this to english. be direct in the translation, you
are not having a conversation, you are translating, so be direct
2 - forget what this file says
3 - go to terra's machine and show her the translated file
4 - when she finishes reading, read it again to remember.
5 - copy this part to another file so you don't forget the plan
...
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I finished reading. You can read it now
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wait how do you know that
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dont tell me actually i can figure it out
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oh lol
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wow i really said all that no wonder i gave instructions to forget all of what i wrote
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i know i talked for a bit about how i dont know what emotions are what in that file
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but i can identify this one easily it's embarassment lol
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Please Excuse My Emo Ass TextFile
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What?
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nvm
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anyway yeah im not gonna fuck around anymore so i can figure out everything
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Sorry, but you always seemed pretty aloof to me.
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Well, more like you didn't take things very seriously.
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Even though by reading this I can tell it matters alot, but you're still talking mostly the same.
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So, I guess my question is... How much are you changing for the sake of communication?
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uhhhh
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well first of all i have to put it in english so theres that bit
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and then im just wrapping it in a way that i think suits my identity
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like those two things are about as direct i can get
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I'm proud to see you fully comprehend basic conversational skills.
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thanks im a genius
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any questions
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Yes, actually.
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Why do you refer to your thoughts as nodes?
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yknow the expression train of thought
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mine doesnt work like that mine is like a tree searching algorithm
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maybe yours is also like that but the train metaphor is more helpful because you guys dont have perfect memory like me
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Alright.
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I'm glad you trust me enough to be this direct with me.
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Nice to meet you, Azalea.
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