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HAL had no choice as to what his goals were, nor could he opt to not pursue them. Humans can opt not to follow orders; HAL cannot. Ultimately, he ended up att
by at_a_remove 7y ago
HAL had no choice as to what his goals were, nor could he opt to not pursue them. Humans can opt not to follow orders; HAL cannot. Ultimately, he ended up attempting to satisfy both constraints by killing crew members.
The search for a solution space gave an empty set when it came to crew members and that was that. While HAL undoubtedly had some life-preserving behaviors in his goals, he would -- in such a critical mission -- have had programmed in an escape hatch if presented with a kind of trolley problem wherein a crew member might live (but the mission fails) or selecting to kill a crew member (by action or inaction) and allowing the mission to go forward.
Then, by induction, he continues to subtract one from the N crew members until he would have a solution that satisfies the constraints: zero, the trivial case.
Each step of this comes down to humans.
- bluntfang 7y agoDoes a human have the ability to opt out of orders if the punishment for opting out is death?
- vorpalhex 7y agoThere are many examples historically of people choosing death over following orders.
- speedplane 7y ago> There are many examples historically of people choosing death over following orders. There are also many examples of people being exonerated for horrible deeds because they were "just following orders".
- earlINmeyerkeg 7y agoFree will is something you have the power to act on, regardless of external influences. Just because the fear of punishment exists doesn't mean that a person cannot opt out. It's the same thing as if an officer during war told you to retreat, however you still defy that order to rescue a fallen comrade in the presence of immediate danger.
- jariel 7y agoI think the question with HAL is more existential than that; there are lingering questions about the degree to which he was actually conscious.