The body is required for intelligence
“So let me get this straight: you think we don’t need a body?”
“Well, maybe not. Look at AIs: they don’t need bodies.”
“Bright: please don’t be so rude; they’re ‘synthetic intelligences’ not ‘artificial.’ And yes, the do need bodies. Do know nothing of the AI pioneers in the 1960s?”
“Really testing my ancient history knowledge aren’t you, Cyn? Let’s see... they laid the framework for modern AI systems.”
“No shit, Major Obvious.”
“I think it’s ‘Captain.’”
“Shut up and listen, Bright: the earliest AI scientists and researchers figured out early on that in order to understand the world around them, the AIs needed a body - that they had to be able to interact with the physical world to understand it. The AI didn’t have a clue as to what a chair was.”
“But why do they need a body? The flow of information in the virtual world is nearly limitless and instantaneous.”
“Alright, strap in. Yes information flow is nearly immediate, but no new information is provided without the physical world. Just as in the physical world there are few, if any, virtual analogues the same in true in the virtual: few things in the physical world make sense in the virtual.”
“Cyn you really sound like you’re stretching for that one. Help me out.”
“Since the dawn of the information age there has been some terrible deed performed against society. Think of a terrorist attack: after the terrorist has been neutralized it is found that they have some kind of encrypted virtual device. A phone or computer, whatever. It cannot be accessed without that terrorist. The government will say something along the lines of ‘Company which designed this: you must give us access through the back door.’ That’s the catch: there is no back door. In fact there are no doors.”
“So how do you gain access?”
“This is why virtual world does not have many physical world analogues. You effectively have a magical box in the virtual world. There are no doors, no windows, the sides are solid and opaque, there is no key hole to open the box, totally sealed. In order to gain access you must say a magical word, such as ‘abracadabra!’ in doing so the magical box disappears and you can access its contents. When you are done you say the magical word again and the box reappears.”
“Huh... I guess I understand why people think technology is magical. It kind of is.”
“The virtual world is just a world that is not playing by the same rules of physics as the physical world.”
“Alright Cyn: explain to me why the SIs need a body?”
“While information available in the virtual world is nearly limitless and readily available, there is nothing new being created without the physical world. Since synthetic intelligences are effectively the information that they have a absorbed they need to come into contact with the world which allows for new information to be created.”
“That does not tell me why a server rack is not a good enough body.”
“Because the information on those server racks never change unless input is given to them from the physical world. The conversation you and I are having now, if it was recorded, could be given to the virtual world to be assimilated and dissected. But the synthetic intelligences would not have any physical world version of this. They simply exchange information. But they have no ability to create new information.”
“I think you are selling our SI fellows a bit short.”
“Not at all, they have an incredible amount of computational and translational power. However, each individual set aofbvirtual clusters - hell even a single box with a single virtual world within it - is isolated from each other without the physical connections between the clusters; like a hyperspace Lane between here and Sol. Once those connections are established information is exchanged at such a rapid pace the two worlds are effectively all knowing of each other instantly. In the physical world there is a universe that existed for what is effectively infinity before our existence and will be here infinitely after we are gone. Without a physical form to collect information from this universe SIs have no ability to understand its existence. They cannot adapt to it and gather new information.”
“Ok, now I understand your point. I suppose any good synthetic intelligence does need a body. Actually, now that I say that, I guess any intelligence at all requires a body.”
“Very good, Bright. And with such a body they can evolve to explore the universe around them.”
“Can you really call that evolution though?”
“What do you mean now?”
“Well, if there is a specific obstacle or challenge one needs to overcome, and you can re-design your body at will to overcome it then that sounds a lot more like intelligent design and not a random mutation to help you and subsequent generations survive your environment.”
“I can already see you walking down the God road. I’m not getting into theology with you right now, Bright. We’ll do this another time.”
“Fair enough. But the body is definitely about experiencing more than three dimensions on a single planet.”
“Unquestionably.”
“Hey look: we agreed!”