New Earth Experiment

[Rook]

A recent conversation with Blar in the box of chatting has lured my mind to an interesting hypothetical scenario.

Imagine an island, let us say it is tropical, or at least capable of sustaining fruit-bearing trees and grazing mammals.

A facility is upon the island, stocked with enough food and water generation facilities for at least a thousand years.

Now, a creche: About 1000+ newborn humans, 50% female and 50% male, representative of most human races/cultures, tended by proficient robotic minders. These children are raised 'normally', as in, the robots talk to them, feed them, clean them and perform other human actions around them and later teach them language and how to operate both the facility and survive on the island.

For their later years, there are archives of scientific significance which may teach them the precepts of many fields. There is no literature nor are there sociological/religious texts. Contact with the outside is impossible, and a type of barrier has been set up some kilometers offshore to prevent transport to or from the island.

So here are the questions: After the 1st generation reach adulthood, what type of social structures may they have developed? Will they have developed philosophy, religion, war, a class system? How will they view the robots?

What about the 3rd gen, or the 15th?

This is a purely hypothetical scenario and you may postulate upon it any way you wish.

(NB: the robots are better described as androids, as in electric sheep/blade runner, thus very human-like in appearance and actions. Their artificial nature is to prevent randomized religious, cultural, moral or ideological contamination of the newborns)

 

[Ex-User (9086)]

Are they taught one language or is there some racial/cultural segregation? Not sure why they can't be homogeneous for this thought experiment.

 

[Rook]

They are taught in the same language. Racial diversity is for the sake of greater genetic variation in future generations.

 

[Ex-User (9086)]

These children are raised 'normally', as in, the robots talk to them, feed them, clean them and perform other human actions around them and later teach them language and how to operate both the facility and survive on the island.

How do the robots socialise the children? Are they taught rules of conduct? Are they encouraged to cooperate, etc? I think it's inevitable there would be a convention of rewarding attention and receptiveness to knowledge at the very least.

 

[Rook]

How do the robots socialise the children? Are they taught rules of conduct? Are they encouraged to cooperate, etc? I think it's inevitable there would be a convention of rewarding attention and receptiveness to knowledge at the very least.

Hmmmm...the hardest part to formulate.
It may be better for forumites to envision their own methods of upbringing when formulating their predictions for such a society.

Should there be different types of education/upbringing enacted by the androids?

I personally would not let the robots enforce codes of conduct or attempt to enforce a stringent system of behavior upon the children or even reward certain types of conduct, but that may invalidate the experiment. An open-ended approach may be best for the factors you have named.

 

[Ex-User (11125)]

Well unless the robots are some kind of oppressive entity, i dont really see how they can prevent organic and inevitable "contamination" like you're saying

 

[Rook]

Well unless the robots are some kind of oppressive entity, i dont really see how they can prevent organic and inevitable "contamination" like you're saying

It is only initial contamination that should be prevented.

The whole point of the experiment(should have stated this at the start >.<) is to think of new cultures, religions, social structures and general states of humanity that will develop on the island.

So, in essence, if you remove the entire non-genetic history and identity of humanity from a group of newborns, you force them to create new structures of existence within the parameters of contemporary scientific knowledge.

Basically, re-forge the species into something that is not influenced by Charlemagne, Popes, Confucianism, Athena, Hemingway and Homer. The only guides they have is current scientific knowledge and themselves.

 

[Ex-User (9086)]

I think it's very biased in favour of the initial conditions. Entertaining the children is a necessity, so some kind of toys or fairytales need to be told in order to stimulate their imagination. Those toys may later be shared in collective activities and become first sports, fairytales may induce dreams of creation myths or abiogenesis.

What happens if the children fight? The obvious response would be to prevent it from happening and so the first non-violence principle is enforced in order to ensure the survival of every child, it heavily influences what adults will find permissible in the future.

Are they taught to eat animals or provided with a full diet based on vegetables and fruit? The status of animals and their treatment may influence how they approach new lifeforms and how they go about seeking resources. And many other details like that.

 

[Ex-User (11125)]

Okay :P
so i take it you mean this new generation will not be taught any type of philosophy? but how can science or "facts" be taught divorced from philosophy? Can pupils who are ignorant of interdisciplinary and philosophical dimensions of a specialised science arrive at a genuine...ummm... (universal) theoretical understanding of it in the first place?

Edit: nvm blarraun said what I was trying say in a much better way

 

[Rook]

This is getting so damnably complex...it seems that the beliefs of those that initiate the experiment will still greatly affect the morals of the new population(Attitude to meat as food, to violence, to amount of power androids have over children)

Toys: Toys will follow themes found on the island, for instance models of the animals, plants and androids/children, or even smaller models of the facility itself, like a dollhouse. Sports can be basic, chess, go hopscotch etc. are acceptable as they do not require narratives.

Stories: If the androids 'read' to the children, stories can be either randomly generated or pre-written unbiasedly with a slight melding of fantasy and themes of the island, and a life-lesson included.

(Child had to fetch fruit, could not climb tree, asked nearby child to stand on their shoulders: Fruit attained, but first child fell down. Carry wounded child to home etc etc etc)

[*NOTE: The children to do not need to be taught in specific, complex scientific fields from the start. The archives exist there, and it may be later generations who fully utilize them. We do have at least a 1000 years to play with here, so the initial conditions may become negligible after some time, or very relevant...ughhh]



Well...the results will be radically altered based on diet, pre-set laws and moral programming of androids. It is better then for each prediction to clearly state the nature of these parameters, then at least this experiment can have different types of biases that bring about results instead of one.

 

[Ex-User (9086)]

Interesting point about robot's looks. It touches on our associations of ideas and symbols. If robots were to look symbolically human, what would occur if children were to find one damaged model? What if their internals were different from their own "internal components"?

This would shatter their identity quite a bit, they could come to view androids as a different species, etc.

 

[Rook]

Hmmm, I did think about dead androids and to what extent the children will see them as human.

Should the robots deny their humanity from the start?
Should the population be given the means and knowledge to produce more robots, thus eliminating the need for labour? In my mind, no for point 2.

One thing I did think was that the 1st gen robots should de-activate, after it has been assured that the 1st-gen humans will know how to care for their offspring.

 

[Pyropyro]

They can still see the world and astronomical objects right?

I'm guessing that they will have at least a pseudo-cargo cult going on with the androids as angels and the astronomical objects as deities.

Even if they are given scientific knowledge, they will still associate that with spiritual connotations (we can't help it really). Consider the current alternative medicine trend, it's basically a little religion with 'priests' that are clad with "MD's" and "PhD's". The claims aren't scientifically proven but the faith of the followers say otherwise.

 

[Anktark]

I tried to think about this situation and keep hitting "Too many variables" wall. Let's say all subjectivity, from the way robots talk, to scientific teachings writing style, is avoided. Depending on how much scientific information is provided, the populous might become interested why are they on this island if the Earth described in the teachings is bigger and different.

Can't forget about bias in language and writing either. Languages have a lot of quirks that are easier to spot for multilingual people, like, English does not have one word for "day after tomorrow"; then there is the sentence structure, etc. Even the way we write date has meaning. Even more so, language defines the limits of the range of thought (that can be shared). Will we let them know definition of the word "slavery"? How about "freedom", "crime", "gallows" or "husband"?

Since this is (so far) a thought experiment, can we just beam conceptual knowledge directly into everyone's brain? But that will prevent natural formation of personality as we understand it.

Maybe it's time I stopped poking and start thinking.

The possible social structures range is limited a bit by human biology. There is the Dunbar's number (150 friends limit), group conversation split limit (7 I think?) and others I can't remember right now.

I'll come back after more thinking, maybe we could run some mathematical simulations on this?

 

[Cognisant]

The children will imitate the robots, they'll get along at first but without conflict management skills (since the robots all acted with the same purpose) this will soon devolve into anarchy until tribalism is developed and with it some semblance of order.

With such a small number of people in such a small area they're unlikely to develop beyond hunter-gatherer tribes.