[ExI] The Chess Room

[Will Steinberg]

They would have to be intentionally trying to do so, but I think the
consciousness-giving parts of our brain might also all "strive" towards a
common purpose, if only in that they engage in some similar behavior that
leads to the mind.

Here is my proposed experiment.  We have two computer terminals.  One is
connected to one monitor and one keyboard; this is the observer's station.
 The other is connected to ten or so monitors and ten or so keyboards.  Both
screens display some sort of messaging program.  Each keyboard is connected
to a RNG, which randomly selects a keyboard to be the only active one after
the enter key is pressed on the currently active one to send a message.
 This could be done in a very easy, completely digital way.  Using the
internet, we could even have people operate from the comforts of their own
home.  Running this en masse online would be the best way to gather a lot of
data quickly.

The ten people forming the otherbrain are given a few rules.  They are told
that it is their goal to, without communicating amongst themselves, trick
the person on the other side into believing he is talking to a singular
person.  Each of the component people is encouraged not to espouse his or
her own ideas as to the otherbrain's personality (as this would lead to a
disjointed, obviously fake set of responses) but instead to go with the flow
in a manner of speaking and let their "person" develop.

I would argue a few things:

1. The mind will always reach an equilibrium where all ten people are able
to produce responses that fit for the particular emergent mind.  One might
even say that they do this by knowing what that mind is like, by being
familiar with its personality and reactions, though it seems to lack a locus
of awareness.

2. The experiment, when repeated with those ten people, will tend to form
similar minds.  This is hard to know because the people will get to know the
test and may produce the same character, but they should once again be
encouraged to have no preconceptions as to what the mind will be but instead
let it happen.  I find it hard to believe that the experiment would not
produce minds in at least some range of similarity.  That range would
provide some information about how those ten minds could form a consistent
one.

If anything, this would have interesting applications to psychology, group
intelligence, and even things like chaos theory (seeing if initial
directions of the otherbrain's development would sway the outcome of the
experiment.)

If anyone has experience enough to help set up this experiment, it could be
run on the internet pretty simply.  It is something I would like to do.
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