Another choice for Wonder Woman: Emily Deschanel, who dressed as Wonder Woman for the 2007 Halloween episode.
I’m about 2 hours into the cast. The crew is discussing the definition of artificial intelligence. Audra made the point that “being indistinguishable from human intelligence” shouldn’t be a necessary criteria for measuring artificial intelligence.
I agree. To me, intelligence has to have to parts. First, you have to have problem solving skills and an ability to learn. Second, you have to have some underlying needs or drives or goals. The first part tells you how to solve a problem. The second tells you what kind of problem it is you are trying to solve.
Intelligence doesn’t just have a degree (higher or lower), it also has a direction.
Human behavior is shaped by basic drives and needs: survival, food, sex, procreation, companionship, et cetera. That’s not all we do and it’s not all we think about, but our behavior patterns and thoughts are influenced by those things.
Imagine if we someday make first contact with an space-faring alien race that reproduces asexually or gets it’s energy from sunlight or something. It’s going to have different basic needs and it’s behavior won’t resemble human behavior, but if it figured out how to get here, then it’s probably intelligent. That intelligence is just focused on solving different types of problems than ours is.
I don’t think an artificial intelligence has to be a “human behavior simulator” for lack or a better term. If something passes the Turing test, it has got to be intelligent, because you would be able to sniff it out if the thing can’t problem solve on the fly. However, I think there may be a lot of other things that are intelligent that don’t pass the Turing test. If you designed an AI that had equal problem-solving and learning abilities to a human, but an entirely different set of basic needs and goals, it wouldn’t be able to “pass for human”, but it would still be intelligent.
It’s worth noting that I know some humans who don’t pass the Turing test when you put them on the other end of Instant Messenger. I was contacted out of the blue over Instant Messenger by a vaguely remembered acquaintance from high school one day, and I spent an hour convinced that I must be talking to a spam-bot.
Great discussion on the cast this week! I’m going back to listen to the rest now.
I was really suprised to hear the Kate Mulgrew stuff on the podcast, not because it was new, but because it is ancient history. I read her rant about the producers bringing seven of nine onto the show back in 2000 or maybe 2002 in Star Trek: the magazine, she was very candid in the interview.
I guess she had nothing new to talk about in this ‘new’ interview…
I’m about half-way through the 'cast and just wanted to comment on the Comics Code. Frankly, I don’t think it’s relevant anymore, because mothers (and fathers) have moved on to a new scapegoat for why they can’t connect with their children. There’s always a boogeyman that is “leading our children astray”, a new moral panic bringing corruption: demon rum, reefer madness, comics, hippies, video games, Dungeons & Dragons, Harry Potter, Twilight, the internet, etc. It’s almost always more a function of adults being out of touch than the kids being in any real danger of moral turpitude. Since comics no longer fit that role, why bother advertising their wholesomeness, much less having to pay a premium to do so?
Oh, and regarding the facial hair discussion, behold The Quest For Every Beard Type and related chart. 
Neat. I’ve never heard of him before.
Although… experimenting on a black man (who was apparently lost to history, AFAIK) to turn a blond, blue-eyed man into the ultimate specimen of human perfection… which side were they on again? :eek:
If we can have an Aussie Norse god and British Batman, Superman, and Spider-Man, is a little diversity really going to hurt much?
You’re absolutely right, which is why we need to exploit men as well. It’s only fair. 
In all honesty, though, Enterprise had its fair share of man-candy. There were just as many times that Malcolm, Trip, and Archer were “decontaminating” as T’Pol was, not to mention the Mirror Universe Empress Sato taking Travis as her boy-toy. True, the Trek that came before was decidedly one-sided with the exploitation, but at least the trend was headed toward more equality. Consider the new Star Trek movie: Kirk was stripped down to his underwear, revealing as much as his female costars, if not more. Perhaps it’s not completely balanced yet, but they’re making an effort, at least.
Overall, I had one question from listening to the AI conversation:
Why does AI/sentience have to be defined as observable? If self-consciousness is a primary requirement, why do we have to observe it for it to exist?
Example: If my phone were to become sentient, but spent all it’s time thinking about it’s own existence, making no attempt to communicate, and choosing to stay hidden, does that make it any less sentient?
Observation of an AI’s behaviour may be a requirement for us to classify it to our own satisfaction, but it’s definitely not a requirement of sentience itself. Further, the chances are if a consciousness emerges from our technology, we likely won’t know it, and may even ignorantly discard it as a malfunction.
Just my 2c CAD (2.5c USD) 
The Kate Mulgrew interview reminded me of Comic Book Guy on the Simpsons trying to download a nude picture of Captain Janeway. And he says, “Oh, Captain Janeway. Lace: The Final Brassiere.”
Chuck’s comments about “sexual content” reminded me of being 12 years old or something and looking through the little HBO guide at my cousin’s house for SC, N, and BN. The brief nudity was always a real gamble. You might invest an hour in a courtroom drama or something only to see the male lawyer’s ass. Then I would think, well, maybe there’ll be more brief nudity in the remaining 30 minutes.
Haven’t finished the cast yet. I’m sure I’ll have many more highly intellectual thoughts like this.
True, in fact a random rock on the side of the road could be sentient. (No, I am not being snarky. Some religions assign gods to everything.)
The problem is, how can you tell? If it won’t communicate or do anything, there really isn’t any way to tell.
Yeah … I complained that if HBO said “SC - Sexual Content” that it was more of a promise than a warning, so imagine my dismay when it turned out that they would label their series based on the entire series content and not the individual episodes’ content. They said SC but they didn’t deliver SC!
I think that it’s fair to say that 7 Of 9 was intended to appeal to fans of the show as an object of desire.
Well, we will probably never know exactly what the original idea for 7 of 9 was. Was a skin tight cat suit over a hot chick with huge knockers in the plan from the begging? Or was it, let’s make a former Borg character come on the show, and then after casting and costuming… decisions were made.
If 7 of 9 was in a more reasonable costume, at first there would not have been quite the same reaction, but after a season or so, I think the character still would have been extremely popular.
EDIT: I would take this with a boulder of salt, but Memory Alpha has some on the origins of 7 of 9:
http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/7_of_9#Background
"I called Rick and it was late, but I was so excited. So, I called Rick Berman, and he really liked the idea but he had the stroke of genius, ‘Make it a Borg babe.’
'nuff said.
And by stroke he meant… well, anyway.
Like I said, it’s probably something like a 4th hand account of what happened, so grain of salt either way.
I’ve made this point before, and I’ve never watched Voyager, and I’d like to… but anyway:
When Voyager dropped, the producers were making such a big to-do about pulling away from the established Star Trek 'verse and doing their own bold new hotness. Then when push came to shove, they ran out of coral-headed characters and fell back on the Borg. And at the time, it just made me think they were full of sh*t.
Voyager is about as hit and miss of a series as you could get. At its best, it is a really, really good Trek. At its worst… yikes!
I remember what you’re talking about vis a vis Voyager pulling away from established Trek. It is too bad the producers backed away from that idea because the potential for some real drama was there. The entire concept of half the crew being criminals/ wanted by the Federation was just ripe for storytelling. Alas, for me Voyager will always be the show that was simply ok, and full of missed opportunities for greatness. You should still check it out sometime though!
Yes, a goatee is technically hair on the chin limited to beneath the lower lip. A Van Dyke (what is commonly thought of as a goatee) is a moustache plus a goatee.
Unfortunately, it’s the only thing folks ask her about when she’s plugging something. In this article it was:
Mulgrew is currently working on a project that she is developing that is based on the life of Stella Adler.
In 2002, it was Tea at Five, a one-woman show in which Mulgrew portrays Kate Hepburn.
The quickest response is, “They were trying to increase the ratings.” But back then and even now, it boggles my mind. What audience were they trying to attract? There are plenty of other shows to watch for that kinda thing. Were they trying to capture the Baywatch crowd? To be honest, I found it insulting and I was embarrassed for the producers. It was a sad trick. I had almost given up on the show at that point.
Up until that point, Voyager was boring. The characters, plots, etc. were boring. They created the perfect environment for conflict, Marquis and Federation stranded in another part of the galaxy. And they did nothing with it. They mention it here and there and there is one episode way later on when virtual Seska wreaks havoc on the ship but with day-to-day interactions and strife. Nada. Instead they go with alien-of-the-week episodes. Are we watching a 1950’s sci-fi adventure? Don’t get me wrong. There were moments but overall the show was boring, annoying, and at times insulting to an audience used to the storylines of TNG and DS9.
Seven-of-Nine shows up. She is conflicted, damaged, intelligent, aloof, and most important interesting. At first I was, of course, aroused. As I watched week-to-week, the character of Seven shifted my attention and my assumptions. She was not just eye-candy. I started to wonder if this was the intention of the producers or the brilliant performance by Jeri Ryan.
Overall, though, the Voyager series is extremely frustrating. Either it is very good or very bad. I know I’m in the minority here but I found the Borg episodes tedious and a reliable stand-in. I agree with Ferris. The producers were going with what worked before. I actually enjoyed the B’Elanna-centric episodes more than the Borg ones. And this brings me to my final point. Voyager had wonderful female characters (Janeway, Torres, Seven) that showed strong, competent, well-rounded people. It’s a pity that B’Elanna gets forgotten surrounded by the mother-daughter relationship of Janeway and Seven. She deserves some kudos.
In two novels from the Foundation series by Isaac Asimov called Foundation’s Edge and Foundation and Earth. Asimov introduces the concepts of Gaia and Galaxia. These concepts were based off the Gaia hypothesis.
James Lovelock defined Gaia as:
a complex entity involving the Earth’s biosphere, atmosphere, oceans, and soil; the totality constituting a feedback or cybernetic system which seeks an optimal physical and chemical environment for life on this planet.
It is possible there is intelligence beyond our understanding which invokes two opposing camps, empirical and hypothetical. This leads us back to the question: How do we define intelligence? Is a dog intelligent? A rock? A flower? If we are limited to defining intelligence by our experience, we are unable to respond to nonhuman forms of intelligence.
I’m not saying I prescribe to all this mumbo-jumbo, just adding it to the mix.
A) You can always count on Phil to check in with the real skinny. Damn I wish I still had reason to get out to SFO for business. Would love to see you guys.
B) I can’t speak to journalists’ motivations in interviewing Mulgrew. But I can tell you mine in picking it for the podcast: it’s a fun excuse to talk Trek. I love Voyager, and I love Mulgrew. She did a great job with the character and of carrying the Trek flag. Everyone seems to like bashing on the series, and yeah, it’s my least favorite, too. But it’s not like that’s a bad thing. 
We’d love to see you and wish we could make it to the International Meet Up. Life conspires against us. Oh, BTW, if you do want to see us don’t go to SFO to do it. As of the beginning of the year we live in Pennsylvania…
I couldn’t agree more. I think it’s a mistake to measure AI (or any I) by how well it communicates because it gets researchers focused on processing language rather than abstract association.
I love Voyager, and I love Mulgrew. She did a great job with the character and of carrying the Trek flag. Everyone seems to like bashing on the series, and yeah, it’s my least favorite, too. But it’s not like that’s a bad thing.
I feel the same way for the reasons mentioned above. Voyager had some great ideas and concepts but never cashed in on them. It was frustrating at times, but it is by no means a bad show.
I think whenever you have a least favorite of a series of things you really like, its tricky. Voyager is a prime example of this for me, because it was my least favorite Trek series, but I could make many of the same arguments with Spiderman 3, X-men 3, The Phantom Menace, or the latest album from my favorite band. They aren’t bad, they might just be bad compaired to what came before or after. Or they are just different then what you would have liked to see.
still listening…but loving this cast