[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 5]
[House]
[Pages 6512-6514]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        ENGINEERED INTELLIGENCE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
California (Mr. Sherman) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SHERMAN. Thank you.
  Mr. Speaker, I come to the floor to focus on an issue that I have 
been discussing with my colleagues for almost a decade and that I have 
brought to this floor several times since the year 2000. That is an 
issue I call ``engineered intelligence.'' By that, I mean the efforts 
of computer engineers to develop computers with intelligence that far 
exceeds that of the normal human being and, likewise, the efforts of 
biological engineers to create either intelligence enhanced forms of 
human beings, or new life forms that have intelligence far beyond that 
of the average human.
  Mr. Speaker, I believe that science will have a greater impact on the 
coming century than it has had in the last several centuries, knowing 
full well of the enormous impact that science has had in the last 100 
and 200 years.
  As one futurist points out, if someone describes the future 40 years 
from now and paints a picture that looks like a science fiction movie, 
that picture may be wrong, but if someone is discussing the future 40 
years from now and paints a picture that does not look like a science 
fiction movie, then you know they are wrong. We will be living in a 
science fiction movie. We just don't know which one.
  I believe that the issue of engineered intelligence is one that will 
have a greater impact on humankind than even the development of nuclear 
weapons. Just a few years before nuclear weapons were first exploded, 
Albert Einstein wrote to Roosevelt, and explained that it was possible 
to create such a nuclear bomb. In fact, just a few years went by before 
it was a reality.
  Now we have not a few years, but a few decades, to wrestle with the 
enormous ethical, theological and sociological impacts of the 
technologies that are out there--just 10, 20, 30 years away. My fear is 
that we will over the next 10 years do what we have done over the last 
10 years: Basically, waste the time that we so urgently need to deal 
with issues that we have just begun, that we really have not begun, to 
think through.
  Now, as we develop more intelligent computers, we will find them 
useful tools in creating even more intelligent computers, a positive 
feedback loop. I don't know whether we will create the maniacal Hal 
from 2001: A Space Odyssey or the earnest Data from Star Trek. My guess 
is that we will create them both. There are those who say don't worry 
because even the most intelligent or malevolent computer is in a box, 
and cannot affect the outside world. But I believe there are those of 
the human species who would give

[[Page 6513]]

hands to the devil, in return for a good stock tip.
  I do draw solace from the fact that because a computer is intelligent 
or even self-aware, that this does not mean that it is ambitious. That 
is, will it try to affect the outside world? Will it have a survival 
instinct?
  My washing machine does not seem to care whether I turn it off or 
not. In contrast, my pet mouse does seem to care. We should be working 
on elements to implant in computers to prevent self-awareness, survival 
instinct and ambition. But I know no politician is supposed to say 
that, because it sounds wacky; it sounds like science fiction. But if 
we are not talking about things that sound like science fiction, then 
we are not talking about the real issues that will confront us in the 
generation to come.
  We also should focus not only on computer engineering but on the 
engineering of DNA. Biological engineering starts with an inherently 
ambitious raw material. Virtually all life forms seem to seek to 
survive, seem to try to affect their environment to achieve that 
purpose. Most of them seem to care whether their progeny survive. Now, 
bioengineers could create a 1,000-pound mammal with a 100-pound brain 
that will beat your kids on the LSAT.
  These are issues that deserve the attention of all of us in the 
public sphere but particularly those who are our best philosophers, 
theologians and sociologists.
  I thank the Chair for giving me the time to, once again, bring these 
issues before the House, and I look forward to working with my 
colleagues to see that these issues are confronted long before science 
confronts us with new reality.
  I believe that the impact of science on this century will be far 
greater than the enormous impact science had on the last century. As 
futurist Christine Peterson notes: If someone is describing the future 
30 years from now and they paint a picture that seems like it is from a 
science fiction movie, then they might be wrong. But, if someone is 
describing the future a generation from now and they paint a picture 
that doesn't look like a science fiction movie, then you know they are 
wrong.
  We are going to live in a science fiction movie, we just don't know 
which one.
  There is one issue that I think is more explosive than even the 
spread of nuclear weapons: engineered intelligence. I have spent nine 
years focused on this issue \1\ By ``engineered intelligence'' I mean 
the efforts of computer engineers and bio-engineers who may create 
intelligence beyond that of a human being. In testimony at the House 
Science Committee,\2\ the consensus of experts testifying was that in 
roughly 25 years we would have a computer that passed the Turing 
Test,\3\ and more importantly exceeded human intelligence.
  As we develop more intelligent computers, we will find them useful 
tools in creating ever more intelligent computers, a positive feedback 
loop. I don't know whether we will be creating the maniacal Hal from 
2001, or the earnest Data from Star Trek--or perhaps both.
  There are those who say don't worry, even if a computer is 
intelligent and malevolent--it is in a box and it cannot affect the 
world. But I believe that there are those of our species who would give 
hands to the devil, in return for a good stock tip.
  I do draw solace from the fact that just because a computer is 
intelligent, or even self-aware, this does not mean that it is 
ambitious. By ambitious, I mean possessing a survival instinct together 
with a desire to affect the environment so as to ensure survival, and 
usually a desire to propagate or expand.
  My washing machine does not seem to care whether I turn it off or 
not. My pet mouse does seem to care. So even a computer possessing 
great intelligence may simply have no ambition, survival instinct, or 
interest in affecting the world.
  DARPA \4\ is the government agency on the cutting edge of 
supercomputer research. I have urged DARPA to develop computer systems 
designed to maximize the computer's utility, while avoiding self-
awareness, or at least ambition.
  I have spoken about computer engineering. But there is a whole 
different area of engineering: bio-engineering. Roughly 30 or 40 years 
from now bio-engineers should be able to start with human DNA and 
create a 2,000 pound mammal with a 300 pound brain designed to beat 
your grandkids on the LSAT. No less troubling, they might start with 
canine DNA and create a mammal with near-human intelligence, and no 
civil rights.
  DNA is inherently ambitious. Those microbes which didn't seek to 
survive or replicate, didn't. Even birds seem to care whether they or 
their progeny survive, and they seek to affect their environment to 
achieve that survival.
  In any case, you have the bio-engineers and the computer engineers 
both working toward new levels of intelligence. I believe in our 
lifetime we will see new species possessing intelligence which 
surpasses our own.
  The last time a new higher level of intelligence arose on this planet 
was roughly 50,000 years ago. It was our own ancestors, who then said 
hello to the previously most intelligent species, Neanderthals. It did 
not work out so well for the Neanderthals.
  I used to view this as a contest between the bio-engineers and the 
computer engineers (or if you use the cool new lingo, wet 
nanotechnology and dry nanotechnology), in an effort to develop a new 
species of superior intelligence. I felt that the last decision that 
humans would make is whether our successors are carbon-based or 
silicon- based: \5\ the product of bio-engineering or of computer 
engineering.
  Now I believe we are most likely to see combinations that will 
involve nature, computer engineering, and bio-engineering: humans with 
pharmaceutical intelligence boosters; DNA enhancements; computer-chip 
implants; or all three. First, this will be used to cure disease, then 
to enhance human capacity. The partially-human will precede the trans-
human.
  Now how should we react to all of this? It is important that we 
benefit from science even as we consider its more troubling 
implications. I chair the House Subcommittee on Nonproliferation which 
deals with the only other technologies that pose an existential threat 
to humankind, namely the proliferation of nuclear and biological 
weapons.
  The history of nuclear technology is instructive. On August 2, 1939, 
Einstein sent Roosevelt a letter saying a nuclear weapon was possible; 
six years later, nuclear technology literally exploded onto the world 
scene. Only after society saw the negative effects of nuclear 
technology, did we see the prospects for nuclear power and nuclear 
medicine.
  The future of engineered intelligence will be different. The 
undeniable benefits of computer and DNA research will arrive long 
before the problematic possibilities. Their introduction will be 
gradual, not explosive. And fortunately, we will have far more than six 
years to consider the implications--unless we choose to squander the 
next few decades. My fear is that our philosophers, ethicists and 
society at large, will ignore the issues that will inevitably present 
themselves until . . . they actually present themselves. And these 
issues require more than a few years of thought.\6\
  I have been urged not to make this issue the centerpiece of my 
reelection campaign. One journalist has told me that he can guarantee 
that computers will not be self-aware or overly intelligent: ``All we 
have to do is get them elected to Congress.''
  I am confident that if we plan ahead we can obtain the utility of 
supercomputers, and the medical treatments available from bio-
engineering, without creating new levels of intelligence. We can then 
pause and decide whether we in fact wish to create a new intelligent 
species or two.
  Finally, I would quote Oliver Wendell Holmes in 1913 when he said, 
``I think it not improbable that man, like the grub that prepares a 
chamber for the winged thing it never has seen but is to be--that man 
may have cosmic destinies that he does not understand.'' \7\
  Likewise, it is possible that within the next 30 or 40 years, our 
children--or should I say ``our successors''--will have less 
resemblance to us than a butterfly has to a caterpillar. I don't know 
whether to cry or rejoice, but I do know that our best minds in 
philosophy, science, ethics and even theology ought to be focused on 
this issue.


                                ENDNOTES

       1. I gave my first speech on the House floor regarding 
     engineered intelligence on May 17, 2000. For speech go to 
     http://thomas.loc.gov/home/r106query.html on page H 3306.
       2. On April 9, 2003, the U.S. House of Representatives, 
     Committee on Science, held a hearing titled The Societal 
     Implications of Nanotechnology. The transcript is available 
     at http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/science/hsy86340.000/
hsy86340_0f.htm
       3. A test to determine whether computers are able to 
     demonstrate intelligence matching a human's. In particular, a 
     human sends text-only messages to communicate with both a 
     computer and another human located in a different room. If 
     the human sending the messages cannot determine if the 
     response messages are composed by the computer or by the 
     human, then the computer has passed the Turing Test. It 
     should also be noted that one route to developing a computer 
     with human intelligence is by reverse engineering the human 
     brain perhaps using nanobots.
       4. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.
       5. While I realize that supercomputers may not use chips 
     with silicon substrate, I still prefer to call computer chips 
     ``silicon''.

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       6. This issue is discussed in ``Brave New World War'' by 
     Jamie Metzl. Published in Issue 8, Spring 2008, Democracy: A 
     Journal of Ideas.
       7. Oliver Wendell Holmes. ``Law and the Court,'' speech at 
     the Harvard Law School Association of New York, 15 February 
     1913.

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