redbugpest wrote:Lundse wrote:Note that Mohiam is against mentats because they are "like" computers - the Bene Gesserit share this trait. She is in no way the one to say that machines inspire distrust.
Also note that if the problem was that machines started murdering and torturing, her dislike of mentats makes no freakin' sense - mentats are not going to do that all of a sudden. Such coloring from old emotions only makes sense if you have a problem with... machine thinking, machine logic, machine-attitude.
So thanks for yet another quote to prove my point...
Not so fast. Why, if machines were just tools, and machine thinking, machine logic, and machine attitude are the real issue, would anyone feel that machines would inspire any distrust. wouldn't it be the people who aspired to be machine like that would inspire the distrust?
No, the machines themselves must have played a larger part than you give them credit for. How could you trust a machine if someone can come along and turn it against you?
This is not exactly the issue of the current discussion, but OK...
Re. your first statement, then we have only Scytale's word that there was "distrust" towards machines - according to him:
"From the days of the Butlerian Jihad when "thinking machines" had been wiped from most of the universe, computers had inspired distrust."
This can easily mean that people hate machines, dislike them, don't want to trust them, etc. It in no ways implies that machines before the Jihad (notice that the statement is about after) were not trustworthy. And it does not matter since we have Alia (and Leto, but never mind that for now) explicitly saying the opposite - and they were there!
And I can easily trust a machine, even though someone can order it to kill me. Like I can trust a gun safety when it can be turned both on and off (and can kill). Or a car that drives whenever someone depresses the speeder (and can kill). If machines had some say in when and if they would fight and kill, I could not trust them (eg. to be bodyguards, and just to do as they are told).
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redbugpest wrote:Lundse wrote:So you are saying that Alia did not count Omnious as a machine, because he was a sentient machine? So she is saying one can trust machine, except sentient ones?
I am saying that if Alia were to feel that way she would have to be differentiating between machine types. It's far more likely that FH was using it to highlight Alia's discomfort in having to deal with Mentats at all. As I recall, the Baron never trusted Piter as well. Alia wanted absolute control and devotion, something she did not feel she could get from Idaho or any of her advisers.
Great example of what is going wrong here!
Alia only has to be differentiating if _you have already decided KJA is right_. Reading Frank's work, there is no reason to assume she differentiates - actually, the passage is quite clear in saying she is thinking about machines, like the ones from before the Jihad. Real, real clear...
And I already agreed with you why the passage is there - why do you keep bringing that up? It is irrelevant as we are talking about the fact of the matter: "You could never distrust a machine".
Do you have any reason, from reading anything by Frank Herbert, to claim that she does not mean machines from the Jihad? Everything else is just obfuscating the issue.
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redbugpest wrote:Lundse wrote:
I am glad you brought up "farfetched" so I won't have to. I'd even go so far to say that "You could never distrust a machine" means any machine. And she was just musing on powerful AIs, like Omnious would have been, so we have every reason to include him in the mix.
And the one reason to exclude him? So the passage will fit with KJAs writing!
Just as your argument attempts to make the Legends series not fit. It quits working unless it is an all or nothing. Even FH broke them into categories. Machines, thinking machines, and Conscious Robots. If you want to play the word game, I can just as easily say, Omnius is not a machine, he is a robot. But that would get us no where.
Frank Never broke them into categories. The only difference lies in the ways people think of them - the Bene Gesserit are pretty rabid and also more or less against mentats, Paul and Leto II are pretty much following Heidegger, and so on.
Where, from books by Frank Herbert, do you get the idea that there was a substantive differences among the machines? Other than that he used synonyms?
You also obscure the difference between argument and premise. My argument is against the Legends series, my premise is about what Frank wrote. Frank wrote: "You could never distrust a machine" (encompassing all), in a passage clearly about machines from the Jihad. I take, from this passage, the idea that in his world, machines could never be distrusted. Please tell me how this analysis is as biased as you claim.
In other words, you are the one who wants a differentiation. Why?
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redbugpest wrote:See above. even if they were doing as programmed, how could you trust that someone wouldn't change the program to turn it against you. That is untrustworthy as well.
No. It is not. That has nothing to do with trusting the machine. I has to do with trusting others. This is getting silly
redbugpest wrote:Alia does not clearly state that she can trust machines completely because of OM. That is an inference that you are making based on your definition of the jihad.
If you do not get, from the fact that Alia has OM, and this statement:
"You could never distrust a machine"
Then there is nothing left to discuss. Try showing it to 7.000 third-graders and tell them what they get out of it. Or try telling me how you can read that passage to mean anything else than what I am saying it means.
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redbugpest wrote:Lundse wrote:redbugpest wrote:The only rational that I can see for her statement to begin with it to think that she is not thinking of the Jihad at all, but musing over a desire to have an adviser that she can use without the worry of them judging her, and acting against her desires.
I agree completely. That is why she was thinking those thoughts. It is entirely irrelevant to the knowledge she obviously has, and which she is employing in formulating the thoughts.
I'm not sure where you were going with this statement.
I am not sure how to explain it to you then...
There are two issues here:
1) Why is the passage there, what does it say about Alia, about the Baron, about Frank's abilities as writer, etc.
2) What facts about the Dune universe can we gather from it?
You seem to retreat into irrelevancies about 1 at every turn. I try to explain that my argument is about 2. No matter motivation or anything else (1), we still know that: Alia has OM and precise knowledge of the Jihad, and that she does not think one can distrust such machines (2). I would like, please, for you to address 2. Start another thread on 1 if you wish, but stop pestering me with it. Please.
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redbugpest wrote:Lundse wrote:[On the Jehanna Butler story in DE]
redbugpest wrote:This is clearly a case of a Machine Intelligence acting on it's own to damage humanity for it's own benefit.
No. It really is not. It is a machine doing as programmed. No ulterior motive. But it was making an ethical decision, and that is why people rose up against them (in part).
So when Frank considered writing a Butlerian Jihad prequel with McNelly, it was because NcNelly understood that the Jihad was about machine which were making decisions better left to mankind itself.
No, the machine has risen above it's original programming. It is clearly stated that it is a self programming machine - putting out of the scope of control of it's designers, and as a consequence is doing what it feels is in the best interests of humanity. It does not have a human telling it who's baby to abort, it is making that decision on its own, using it's own developed sense of ethics.
That was the real threat. Otherwise, why wouldn't the programmers been vilified and the machine been reprogrammed? I think that my take on this is correct, and that FH subscribed to this as well.
Please reread the DE entry. I am not going to explain it to you here. Start another thread if you wish, but lets stick to the Alia argument.
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redbugpest wrote:We are on point because to understand why Alia made a comment like that in the first place we need to understand what she knew and understood about the root causes of the jihad.
No. That's off-point. 1, above. I don't care. I care how much she knew of the Jihad (basically everything, OM and all) and what she thought about the facts at hand. Not why she was thinking what at what moment.
redbugpest wrote:In regards to th third item, that you say is just plain wrong above:
How can you say that you could never distrust a machine when you are in a position of tenuous power, with many enemies that are looking to exploit any weakness to kill you. If that machine could be turned against you, than it is not trustworthy. It's possible that she was referring to the advice that a thinking machine would give her as well, though she should have said something more along the lines of "You could never distrust a machines advise". that would still be within the context of the plot, as she was distrustful of Idaho's advise.
First of all, she does say so. She believes this. And she knows this. No amount of circus acts on your part can change this. And you can certainly trust a machine, even though you cannot trust other people not to tamper with it. Just like I can trust a gun of a good brand, even though a robber could use it against me. You are obfuscating the iussue of trust, and I begin to suspect that you are doing this deliberately - you cannot be so dense as to believe there can never be any trust of any thing unless the universe is aligned so that thing can never be changed by a third party.
The machines, themselves, were trustworthy.
redbugpest wrote:As for Alia being wrong, I do think I have put forward a fair amount of evidence to suggest that she was whether you take Omnius into account or not. Again, I think the foundation of your argument is the weakness in your conclusion.
You have put forth faulty, irrelevant "evidence" and the beliefs of one Tleilaxu with OM.
Forget the above. This is where the debate is at now:
- Alia knew all about the Jihad! And she says you could never distrust a machine.
- You are trying to interpret other evidence to say that she was wrong. But you are only bringing up possible situations where machines could do something else than expected - not cases where machines betrayed anyone. Because a machine cannot, of course, betray anyone. I can only do as asked. Alia knew this. Frank Herbert knew this (he explains the title of his books on computers to mean exactly this - the machine is not a agent at all, it is only a tool: "With Me, You are Nothing").
You cling to this idea that because outside circumstance can make a computer do something else than what it's owner wants, that means the computer is untrustworthy. It does not.