5 ms·

With "Evangelion" being in the (Hacker) news recently, I hope to remind people of this one scene... An advanced AI named "The Three Magi" (which are 3-programs

With "Evangelion" being in the (Hacker) news recently, I hope to remind people of this one scene... An advanced AI named "The Three Magi" (which are 3-programs which vote for strategic effects) exists in the show. Without going too much into details, a problem occurs in the AI, so the lead scientist Ritsuko steps into the machine to check things out. She comes with a circular saw. She cuts open one computer (the one named "Caspar") ... revealing to the audience that inside is a living brain, hooked up to a bunch of wires: https://imgur.com/MTZ7pzU https://imgur.com/MTZ7pzU This is the first point where the audience probably starts to wonder about the ethics of the main characters. The later reveals of their bio-engineering / morals are more horrifying. But this is perhaps the audience's first look into the inner-workings of the NERV organization / science that they do.

calo_star 5y ago
That scene was so cool in a disturbing way!
amelius 5y ago
I can already envision HFT traders putting human brains into boxes which are then colocated at the exchanges and everyone thinks it's okay.
- dr1337 5y ago
  They're already doing it with mice! - https://www.pymnts.com/cryptocurrency/2021/crypto-trading-rodent-beating-the-market/ https://www.pymnts.com/cryptocurrency/2021/crypto-trading-ro...
- wombatpm 5y ago
  Only until they can put clones into an isolated environment to build a sentient AI. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destination:_Void https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destination:_Void
serf 5y ago
>This is the first point where the audience probably starts to wonder about the ethics of the main characters. that's a very impactful scene, but honestly there are moral/ethical red flags about many of the main characters from the very first episode.
- dragontamer 5y ago
  Well, Gendo is definitely seen as an antagonist by this point. But Ritsuko was the flirtatious smart lady up until this point. And honestly, her flirting was mostly just trolling / fun. So I don't think anyone suspected the horrors of her designs until this scene.
edgyquant 5y ago
Yes that would be a tricky issue to decide and I personally don’t think we should worry about it. The future generations will have to decide what their ethical framework allows for however I don’t think we’re on the path to putting a human brain in a PC and attaching wires. Though we may meet half way where a lot of our computing resembles biologically accurate neural nets by the end of the century or something (billions or neurons speaking through trillions of connections.) Maybe this is the first step into getting our society to quit pretending we’re a generation away from human brains being irrelevant. If so I say that’s a good thing, there’s enough doomsaying about the world without trying to write off building cool technology as another apocalyptic fall into dystopia we’re on the verge of.
- dragontamer 5y ago
  I'm a bit of an opposite opinion, in that the difficult ethics questions were with genetics and not necessarily much different with the brain per se. Henrietta's immortal cancer cells were necessary in a large number of modern medicines, including the testing of the mRNA vaccines (one of the cheapest ways to test for human compatibility is to use isolated human cells for tests). I don't see the brain as any more special of an organ than Henrietta's cells. I wouldn't call it a dystopian future: this is much preferred over say, Nazi experiments. But we as a society should strive for better ethics. Maybe not necessarily banning Henrietta cells, but maybe at least paying her family a bit more of the royalties? HeLa cells are really, really important test subjects after all. ------ The real world certainly has different moral questions. Fiction can be used to think about imaginary problems and maybe even provide the discussion material for some real world examples. But we must always ground ourselves back in reality as we make arguments. Lest we become like Don Quixote. (See what I did there? Lol)
  - edgyquant 5y ago
    The only thing I can consider unethical about it, assuming you didn’t just steal a working brain and “imprison” it or something, is that you’re kind of right. What makes us human is more than just our brain but most of what makes up our consciousness (not the subconsciousness) is in the brain itself. So it sounds to me like giving birth to a total vegetable on purpose and not caring what the suffering of the internal brain is. Obviously it wouldn’t be this simple (probably) as the conscience depends on the body and it’s motor functions and outputs as a part of its subconscious. You’d replace those with whatever the wires were connected to and hope you were talking to the brain the way you thought. But assuming we could hand wave that it sounds like an ethical debate that could both be had at some point and allow me to sit out of. Then again when I tried college ethics is the one class I dropped. I like to build things and be able to base them on things it’s possible to infer. Ill leave the ultra nuanced philosophy of what people should do in situations when there are no true answers up to better people than me.
shagie 5y ago
The short story "Weather" in Galactic North ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactic_North https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactic_North ) has a similar reveal, though its a bit more... shall we say "amoral" as it isn't wrong from the perspective of that culture ( https://revelationspace.fandom.com/wiki/Conjoiners https://revelationspace.fandom.com/wiki/Conjoiners ) but rather that its shocking to others.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

calo_star 5y ago

That scene was so cool in a disturbing way!

amelius 5y ago

I can already envision HFT traders putting human brains into boxes which are then colocated at the exchanges and everyone thinks it's okay.

dr1337 5y ago
They're already doing it with mice! - https://www.pymnts.com/cryptocurrency/2021/crypto-trading-rodent-beating-the-market/ https://www.pymnts.com/cryptocurrency/2021/crypto-trading-ro...
wombatpm 5y ago
Only until they can put clones into an isolated environment to build a sentient AI. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destination:_Void https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destination:_Void

serf 5y ago

>This is the first point where the audience probably starts to wonder about the ethics of the main characters. that's a very impactful scene, but honestly there are moral/ethical red flags about many of the main characters from the very first episode.

dragontamer 5y ago
Well, Gendo is definitely seen as an antagonist by this point. But Ritsuko was the flirtatious smart lady up until this point. And honestly, her flirting was mostly just trolling / fun. So I don't think anyone suspected the horrors of her designs until this scene.

edgyquant 5y ago

Yes that would be a tricky issue to decide and I personally don’t think we should worry about it. The future generations will have to decide what their ethical framework allows for however I don’t think we’re on the path to putting a human brain in a PC and attaching wires. Though we may meet half way where a lot of our computing resembles biologically accurate neural nets by the end of the century or something (billions or neurons speaking through trillions of connections.) Maybe this is the first step into getting our society to quit pretending we’re a generation away from human brains being irrelevant. If so I say that’s a good thing, there’s enough doomsaying about the world without trying to write off building cool technology as another apocalyptic fall into dystopia we’re on the verge of.

dragontamer 5y ago
I'm a bit of an opposite opinion, in that the difficult ethics questions were with genetics and not necessarily much different with the brain per se. Henrietta's immortal cancer cells were necessary in a large number of modern medicines, including the testing of the mRNA vaccines (one of the cheapest ways to test for human compatibility is to use isolated human cells for tests). I don't see the brain as any more special of an organ than Henrietta's cells. I wouldn't call it a dystopian future: this is much preferred over say, Nazi experiments. But we as a society should strive for better ethics. Maybe not necessarily banning Henrietta cells, but maybe at least paying her family a bit more of the royalties? HeLa cells are really, really important test subjects after all. ------ The real world certainly has different moral questions. Fiction can be used to think about imaginary problems and maybe even provide the discussion material for some real world examples. But we must always ground ourselves back in reality as we make arguments. Lest we become like Don Quixote. (See what I did there? Lol)
- edgyquant 5y ago
  The only thing I can consider unethical about it, assuming you didn’t just steal a working brain and “imprison” it or something, is that you’re kind of right. What makes us human is more than just our brain but most of what makes up our consciousness (not the subconsciousness) is in the brain itself. So it sounds to me like giving birth to a total vegetable on purpose and not caring what the suffering of the internal brain is. Obviously it wouldn’t be this simple (probably) as the conscience depends on the body and it’s motor functions and outputs as a part of its subconscious. You’d replace those with whatever the wires were connected to and hope you were talking to the brain the way you thought. But assuming we could hand wave that it sounds like an ethical debate that could both be had at some point and allow me to sit out of. Then again when I tried college ethics is the one class I dropped. I like to build things and be able to base them on things it’s possible to infer. Ill leave the ultra nuanced philosophy of what people should do in situations when there are no true answers up to better people than me.

shagie 5y ago

The short story "Weather" in Galactic North ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactic_North https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactic_North ) has a similar reveal, though its a bit more... shall we say "amoral" as it isn't wrong from the perspective of that culture ( https://revelationspace.fandom.com/wiki/Conjoiners https://revelationspace.fandom.com/wiki/Conjoiners ) but rather that its shocking to others.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]