Brains - are not computers that process information

Yes, humans are bad drivers. That's proven by the fatality almost every day in just our country. But, we're comparing human drivers to computers.
That's like comparing which war didn't kill.

No it is not Cicerone. Comparing human drivers to computerized drivers is a pretty easy comparison to make. You simply measure accidents per 100 million miles driven, and fatalities per 100 million miles driven.

These two measure are a perfectly good way to decide which is better.

There are about 33,000 automobile related deaths per year in the US. This is about 3 per 100 millions miles traveled. This is the current rate for human drivers.

Let's say, hypothetically that automobile related deaths for computer drivers was only 2 per 100 million miles traveled. This would mean that it is possible to save 10,000 lives simply by using computer drivers. In this case, I don't think that anyone could logically argue that the 20,000 people who are still dying are a reason to not save the 10,000 lives we can save.

Of course this is only a hypothetical... but I am just pointing out that there are valid comparisons that can be made.

It will be possible to show that computer drivers save real lives (or not). And if this is the case, I don't think that there is a valid reason not to save these lives.

Well, we all know that age has much to do with accident rates. Also, the number of drivers who are concentrating on other things other than driving. There are those who also drink and drive.
No comparison.

Are you really saying that there is no evidence that will change your unfounded belief that computers are better, safer drivers than humans?

The fact that computer drivers don't drink and drive is a pretty good reason to support computer drivers. And the fact that computer drivers don't ever get distracted is a solution to a problem we don't have any other good answer to. But OK.

If the accident rate of computer drivers is shown to be lower than the accident rate of... let's say 25 to 30 year old sober humans.... would you say this is evidence enough to support computer drivers?

I will say clearly... that if computer drivers are shown to be more dangerous than human drivers (or even more dangerous than just sober human drivers) I will change my mind and say that computer drivers should be kept off the road. This seems to be a pretty easy choice to make to save lives?

Your faith in human drivers (which have all sorts of flaws from being distracted, easy to anger, prone to fatigue and sometimes just absent minded) is misplaced. If computer drivers turn out to be significantly safer than human drivers (as evidence is now showing) what will it take for you to change your mind?

This technology has the potential to lower the rate of traffic fatalities by several thousands of lives. And this reduction will be measurable.

At what point do you accept the evidence that this is the case?

Quit arriving at conclusions. I've presented both sides of the issue for people to arrive at their own conclusions.
The only thing unfounded is your conclusion.

I repeat: Yes, humans are bad drivers. That's proven by the fatality almost every day in just our country. But, we're comparing human drivers to computers.
That's like comparing which war didn't kill.

No it's not. I don't see how you think you can compare drivers to wars. They are not even the same class of thing.

My statement is this...

If replacing human drivers with computer drivers results in measurably fewer motor vehicle deaths... then this would be a clear benefit to computer drivers.. The goal here is to reduce the number of fatalities.

This seems like an important, and relevant, goal.

There have been a number of earlier technological improvements to cars that have reduced traffic fatalities including seat belts, air bags and anti-lock brakes. Anti-lock brakes take control from the human driver and put it into a computer (do you remember being taught to pump the brakes yourself?).

I'm kind of amazed that the government has let the self driving Teslas slip through without regulation. Glad to see it though.

I have never considered my brain to be like a computer, and vice versa. As complex as computers can be, they can't come close to the complexity of a human brain.

People seem to need to believe that they understand, and they make analogies that make understanding easier. But the analogies are just that--not the real thing.

I'm reminded of the expression, "Fly like a bird." Although it's true that humans have made great strides in all kinds of flight. But we have not yet been able to duplicate the flight of a bird.

Point well made. Thank you.

Why would I want to fly like a bird?

In a few weeks, I am going to fly from Boston to Atlanta. This is an 1000 mile trip that I will make in about 5 hours (including the time it takes to get on the plane).

Birds smirds... they should want to fly like a human. There is no bird that can go 500 miles an hour, or travel more than a thousand miles in hours without stopping. And, there is certainly no bird that has been to the moon.

Flight is one area where human technology has clearly far surpassed any ability created in nature.

Just because technology doesn't work the same way as nature, doesn't mean that it can't equal or surpass any ability in nature. You don't have to recreate the brain to surpass the mental tasks currently done only by human brains.

Computers are already surpassing our mental ability to play chess, go, predict the weather, fly spacecraft and model nuclear tests.

Just wait until they write better poetry than we do.

Guess whose brains programmed those chess games, and to predict the weather.

They do with their tracery and song.

Sure. But now those chess games are beating the humans who programmed them.

That's pretty cool.

When you want to hear a song, Osso, are you more likely to go get a bird... or do you turn on an electronic device?

Be honest.

Yes, it is. Humans are also capable of also building the atom bomb (MAD).

That's true, Cicerone. Nature does have earthquakes and hurricanes, but at least on Earth, human disasters are even surpassing natural disasters.

depended on my age and where I lived. Mostly I lived and walked by the sea, so real birds, various night herons, snowy egrets, blue heron in my fountain, finches in our trees, mourning doves, were a daily part of our lives. I didn't know all that when I was a kid or teen. I did notice robins in Chicago, when I was around ten.

I'm not as much into music now, though I still have my cds and vinyl. Give me the sight of a roadrunner any day. Or quail.

I do turn on my computer, re news, a2k, and books.

Re the music threads, I enjoy some of them. I am more interested in music from other than the usual places, though, having gotten bored out of my tree by too many over and over oldies but goodies.

Consider this:

Just 700 years ago, every copy of any book in the world was painstakingly written by the hand of a human scribe. Because of the time it took, these books were very hard to produce and only accessible to the wealthiest of the wealthy. Each copy of these books were written by a process that included dipping a quill into ink, and then carefully moving it by hand along paper.

Now a machine can pump out 100 million copies of a book in much less time than it would take a human scribe to copy an single page. You don't own a hand written book, the machine processed books are much better in every way to the human produced ones (cheaper, more readable, more consistent, fewer errors and easier to carry).

The machine doesn't work the same way as the scribe. There is no quill and no movement along the paper. There are now drums and electrostatic belts and toners.

We didn't reproduce the human scribe by replicating the process... we invented a new process that replaced the a human hand with a quill and ink. The human hand, once an essential part of the task of copying a book, became unnecessary.

In the same way, the article is likely write that thinking computers won't replicate the human brain. There may never be axions and neurotransmitters.

That doesn't mean that the computers won't do the thinking currently done be a human brain better than the original.

When we replace the human mind with a computer program (like we replaced the human hand with a printing press), as long as the results are so clearly superior than the original... who cares whether the mechanism is the same?

I think I speak for many when I say I enjoy holding a book in my hand to read. I think computer books are fine for many, and they don't mind not holding a book.
I can't put my finger on it, but why do we enjoy holding a book over a computer tablet?

You didn't read my post, did you.