Intergalactic Summit

I re-read the Code Aria report (http://go-dl.eve-files.com/media/1010/CodeAria.pdf).

And I have two alternative ideas,

1. When the Rogue Drones were originally 'released' (for lack of a better word) by the Gallente, the Dominix was the battleship of choice and quite possibly it was a part of the design of the drones. Or at least something similar to what we today call the Dominix.
2. When the Gallente built gates to the region during Operation "Spectrum Breach", the Dominix was their battleship of choice, and those were probably subverted due to being accessible. I'm not even sure if the Megathron was introduced at the time (88 was before I was born, and I don't have access to a library right now). But it at least explains why they don't utilize Ishtars.

I don't know, but if they can't build them, the amount should be diminishing? Shouldn't they? The Gallente Navy can't lose that many ships to the rogue drones right?

New 'species' of rogue drones have been observed, so they should be able to reproduce to some degree.



Yes, but with that perspective I would have built many computer programs that are sentient, and they really were not, by any sensible definition, sentient. Like an optical for example an optical character recognition system that rewires itself when someone says it did something wrong.

Or did I understand you wrong?

I can understand the anology, we're discussing the wave equation where the important subject of the study is the partial derivative, and boundary conditions; not the specific initial value.

But I can't understand how we're making the second step? Why isn't the neural network that I teach to recognize Achuran not sentient according to that line of reasoning? It is learning, adapting, changing, and reacting to its environment?

Mapping your analogy to hardware holds true, Mr Ixiris. If we take standard software templates describing hardware (used in component level printing in the various technologies available such as photonic, quantum and so on), an Entity describes only the outward facing elements, or ports (I/O) of a component, be it a subsystem or the top-level entity (highest level description).

A process is that something a component exhibits that justifies it's purpose - the orchestration of signals and functions that results in input generating output on a variety of scales. This can also be referred to as a dataflow architecture or real time logic structure.

Simply put, I agree and the analogy maps perfectly, if primitively, to modern hardware manufacturing parlance.

The difference with drones is multigenerational, and possibly intragenerational remapping of components dedicated to sensory, cognitive and communication faculties. It is clear from drone encounters that there is no baseline level of intelligence, with some drones performing repetitive tasks in much the same way as monotask expert systems, while others are capable of at least higher-animal levels of cunning and strategy.

A key fallacy in this subject is the assumption that there is only one mode of thought, that the human model maps a perfect model of what it is to think and act. Assuming that human intelligence is our species trait that determined our fitness for survival, so too does any animal in the cluster that has a place in modern nature have a claim to an 'ideal template when the duality of body and mind are considered'. Simply put, we may classify rogue drones into two broad categories, independent of intelligence; anthro-genesis and auto-genesis intelligences.

Anthro-genesis is the act of a human crafting an intelligence. The ISHAEKA reports seem to provide evidence of this. Key scientists expanded beyond their remit and married self-adaptive algorithms to networked intelligence agents and expert systems, allowing a gestalt intelligence to form based on collective knowledge and the ability to innovate use of such knowledge and the procurement of additional information. This feedback loop seems to logically lead to an emergence of a self-aware entity, and it may be the case that as this is a 'design feature' anthro-genesis means anthrocentrism in the thought patterns and capabilities of the first generation drone in question.

Auto-genesis are those drones which went rogue not due to gaining sentience, but due to damage or malformed command structures. Many models have self-repair and recovery features if they are expected to require long term autonomous activity (prospector and gate builder drones are key candidates for such systems, being large, well provisioned and likely to suffer damage away from expert assistance). The intelligence of these systems is a result of introspective redesign - cognitive components incapable of mapping a solution that ends up with the drone achieving its objective must be at fault, as the directive is immutable, replace, upgrade, retry.

This malformation of the self repair process may lead to the corruption or loss of the original mission - defaulting to the bottom of the switch statement; repair, retry, expand capabilities to process a solution. In such a loop, the drone becomes a self-perpetuating creature with a questionable level of intellect. Does it think? Is it merely the queen termite, creating networked 'workers' and 'soldiers' to carry out its endless objective? What level of intelligence might such a creature gain in this singular pursuit if left for decades to pursue it?

So the beginning of the mystery lies in classifying drones broadly, then individually. Is it possible to classify by origin, then by generational subset? Does the fact that a single drone may evolve greatly in its own life time or spawn heterogeneous (varied) progeny render back tracing to an origin impossible?

More fundamentally, we must define what it is to 'think'? IS it i think therefore I am, and I am thinking because I can recognise the process during and after the fact? Or do I think therefore I survive, a blind instinctual process only wallpapered by ideals of introspection and self-awareness, the awareness of the self extending only to the need to circumnavigate the next event that may end the process that is me?

We're nowhere near the right questions as far as I can see it. Even then, the solution is redefined by every different school of thought and cognitive modification made between this sentence and the next reply; a philosophical and literal race condition in which we are better served by asking this: does drone intelligence represent an anathema to ours? Is this them or us, or is it possible to form an ecological balance between synthetic ecosystems and those of humankind?

While it takes a different form, living creatures have a type of algorithm. Information guides our actions, just the same.

Suppose you see a hot stove. You wouldn't touch it since it would injure you and cause pain. Based on you senses telling you it's hot and past experiences telling you that could hurt you, you seek to avoid it. That's little different than if your brain had the code

hot = dangerous

IF object == hot
THEN object = dangerous

IF object == dangerous
THEN don't touch object


I think it is a simple notion to say that yes, rouge drones can think. So can animals.
It's a different question entirely to ask whether or not they posses forms of sentience and sapience and whether or not they are self aware.



Hardware, perhaps, and the software is initially written, but if I am not mistaken, rouge drones are emergent systems, which means the software does change itself over time as a reaction to events and stimuli, much as a biological brain would, and don't forget that even an infant isn't a complete blank slate, their brains are at least able to maintain enough bodily functions to sustain life (the brain controls breathing, for instance, that's not a learned response even if the ability to control your breathing is)


As far as the issue of what hulls rouge drones use. It may have something to do with how they value certain traits of the hull. The Caldari Navy doesn't use Ishtars either.

Humans, on other hand, think a bit differently.
Lets say, you have a hot pot on the hot stove.
Your algorithm tells you not to touch the object. But if there is my food, I will get gloves or oven fork to lift the pot. You write for yourself new algorithm, because you want that food. Drones don't do that.

On the other hand, you see a gallentean, and he tries to sniff, what do you have in the pot.
Then you just grab the pot regardless it is hot and smash that gallentean's head with it! Disregarding any pain.
Because gallente. Yea.

Pilot Kim,
It would appear that you are unaware of the nature of expert systems and artificially intelligent code.
Both of the above systems are capable of creating new operational parameters and adapting to a changing environment.

if this were not the case, the majority of drone and AI systems in use within the cluster would have little to no effectiveness.

We would suggest you consider the AIMED, or AutoDoc, a weak AI system capable of providing medical assistance.
If this system was unable to adapt to it's situation, it would require a database of every potential illness or injury, along with every possible position and orientation of the injury.
Even with such a database, if unable to adapt, the AIMED would be incapable of modifying treatments to take into account the physiology of it's patient.

This is just a single example of intentional AI adaptability, there are many more.

We would also politely request that you refrain from further racially motivated attacks within this thread. Your personal issues are well known and documented, this is not the correct place for such abrasive statements.

We Return

We did not 'tell you' anything pilot.
We simply stated how your previous comment made you appear ignorant of the facts regarding AI and ES development.

We would suggest you take comprehension courses, as it has become apparent you have difficulty in this area.

Directive Omega-One-Five.
No research into self aware AI can be conducted within Empire / CONCORD controlled space.

We fail to see how this is relevant pilot. The specifics of our existence are known to CONCORD.

We Return.

How can you be so sure? Do you have any evidence?

Can a capsuleer's personality be more than one dimensional?

You stated incorrect sentence, thus


Comprehension courses first must be taken by you.


Please return only after taking aforementioned courses. Thanks in advance.