Will you guys attempt to build a conscious worm?

[aldenc...@gmail.com]

Well, I think that is the goal of this project but with 2 concerns.
1. You guys do not know how to build a conscious worm(no offense).
2. You cannot build a conscious worm due to ethical reason.

So which one is it? I am pretty sure you guys are to build a conscious worm eventually, but what is the current status that is halting you from doing so?


P.S. I am interested in building a digital fish, but the amount of neurons is probably more than what the maximum computational power can handle, just saying

[Stephen]

Hi,

    Since the definition of "consciousness" in any organism has still not been boiled down to specific mechanisms, it is difficult to address directly.

    Instead, the approach we are following is that we are using computer simulations to reproduce the biophysics that are known about the worm's biology.  By assembling as many simulated biophysical phenomena as we know about into a single computer model, we aim to build a model that has behavior that closely matches the real organism.  Where the behavior is different, we identify that as a "gap" and do more research and data collection to fill it in.  And then we iterate.

    As to whether the end product is conscious will be up to others to decide.  Our standard is reproducing the biophysics of this particular living system in a way that you can measure and compare the measurements to the real thing.

    Why this takes so much effort is that putting all the data and biophysics in place so everything interacts appropriately, otherwise known as the modelling process, requires setting a lot up and integrating a lot of data.  Then there is all the testing that needs to happen to make it all come together.

     You can find out more at our docs: http://docs.openworm.org/en/latest/

Thanks,

   Stephen

[aldenc...@gmail.com]

Hi Stephen,
Thanks for the reply. The idea about consciousness is that you are not making the worm think, but the worm is thinking for itself. Maybe if you build it correctly and the worm would start generating its own data? Maybe you could attempt to decode the neurons and its synapses. Easiest way to do this is probably to observe the real worm's synapses. I still think the electromagnetic theory of consciousness plays a role where it requires a magnetic field to be simulated with the neurons to generate consciousness. I am interested in the idea of digital immortality so this project definitely has a lot of potential. Thanks for your time

Sincerely,

Alden Chang

Stephen於 2017年5月18日星期四 UTC+8上午1時46分31秒寫道：