Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized • Hacker News Board

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#391

Post by jqpabc123 » Sun, Jul 12, 2020, 1:16 PM UTC

mcguire wrote: post #364

jqpabc123 wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stating that it has yet to be done is a fact --- and facts are not ignorance

Stating that it has not been done has no implications on whether it can be done, which is the claim being made.

Stating that it is "just chemistry" has no implications on whether it can be done, which was the claim being made.

The fact that it has not been done with "just chemistry" is no proof but it does tend to skew the probabilities toward the view that substantially more may be required.

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#392

Post by empath75 » Sun, Jul 12, 2020, 3:33 PM UTC

codr7 wrote: post #335

baddox wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is "a body" other than inputs and outputs to interface with the environment, and perhaps a mechanism of perceiving the environment and remembering what was perceived?

The capital T-truth is that no one really knows since we're all observing the system subjectively from the inside. Many who practice meditation and/or experiment with psychedelic drugs will tell you that there's something in there that's not a computer. We could assume, as many do, they're fooling themselves; since we can't measure it. Or, we could trust our authentic experience of the real world even when it can't (…

I had the opposite opinion after taking psychedelic drugs.

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#393

Post by webmaven » Sun, Jul 12, 2020, 4:15 PM UTC

User23 wrote: post #384

deleuze wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny, because I'd argue that the belief that "the universe is a Turing machine" is a kind of secular religion. Hardcore physicalists often betray themselves as not only being bad materialists but actually just idealists in denial.

I have to confess I take some pleasure in asking people that say we're living in a simulation "oh, you're a creationist?"

An amusing retort, to be sure, but the "creator" could be an entirely automated process, akin to instantiating a VM or container.

In other words, God has been a replaced with a very small shell script.

So, even if an intelligent creator is ultimately responsible for our plane of existence, there may not be much in the way of intent or even observation associated with that responsibility at any scale we would find meaningful.

Heck, who is to say that our particular simulated universe isn't just a honeypot of some sort?

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#394

Post by webmaven » Sun, Jul 12, 2020, 4:48 PM UTC

phonypc wrote: post #351

codr7 wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But humans learn by themselves, from observing the world around them and drawing conclusions. Which is a major advantage and a core problem in strong AI. The only reason it works is that a lot of humans put a lot of effort into more or less figuring out exactly how to ride a bike. It doesn't generalize at all, teaching the same robot to ride a skateboard would mean doing it all over again.

> It doesn't generalize at all, teaching the same robot to ride a skateboard would mean doing it all over again. This doesn't sound right, but I'm just a curious layman when it comes to AI. I'm thinking AlphaGo vs. AlphaZero. Hypothetically couldn't the same relation exist between an AlphaBike and AlphaRide?

Yes, and not just hypothetically; more generally, transfer learning is definitely a thing, and has been shown to reduce training requirements for unrelated tasks.

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#395

Post by lurquer » Mon, Jul 13, 2020, 5:02 AM UTC

baddox wrote: post #240

mindcrime wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can and absolutely have proven things to be impossible. What would you consider to be an example of that? And how does that square with the Problem of Induction which is the hole in our entire system of empirical knowledge generation?

You can’t make a Turing machine which can solve the halting problem or an algorithm which can determine whether any given mathematical statement is true.

You can prove that 2+2!=5. You could even say that, given the rules governing math, it is ‘impossible’ that 2+2=5. The domain, however, is synthetic and composed of a system of axioms and rules.

If I change the underlying axioms and rules, I could certainly prove that 2+2=5, just as I can prove that The sum of a triangles interior angles exceed 180 degrees, or that two identical number squared can equal -1. (Redefining what a straight line means for the former, and inventing an imaginary number system for the latter.)

Proving what can and cannot follow given a set of rules, however, is not what philosophers mean when they speak or impossibility in the real world.

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#396

Post by lurquer » Mon, Jul 13, 2020, 5:13 AM UTC

michaelmrose wrote: post #97

lurquer wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> do not accept that there is a difference between computation and thought without some meaningful definition of thought. If I know everything about the nature of X, yet I know very little about the nature of Y, it would be illogical to say "I will assume Y is like X until proven otherwise."

I think computation as a model of cognition is a perfectly reasonable hypothesis that will bear fruit and at least it IS a hypothesis instead of hand waving. It is worse to imagine that there is a physical process that exists wholly in the physical world that happens in the world within reasonable parameters cannot possibly be engineered to happen in a controlled fashion. This is a proof that would require a major sh…

It is worthwhile to pursue artificial cognition. Just as it was worthwhile to pursue manned flight.

The difference, though, is that the Wright Brothers were never foolish enough to arrogantly say a bird is actually a type of airplane...

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#397

Post by lurquer » Mon, Jul 13, 2020, 5:18 AM UTC

bawolff wrote: post #212

lurquer wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything is impossible until proven otherwise. You imagine a 'thinking' machine all you want. Doesn't change to reality of the situation that no digital device comes close to thinking. Some find this frustrating. So, they reduce the idea of a brain to a digital computer. Ita a confusion of the Model with that being Modelled. A photo of you, is a representation -- or model -- of you. But, it would be silly to become…

> You imagine a 'thinking' machine all you want. Doesn't change to reality of the situation that no digital device comes close to thinking. Doesn't it though. Someone from the 1800s would probably absolutely think it does. We have computers that can identify what is in a photo, computers that can do complex math problems (pretty sure historically, the ability to do logic was considered first and foremost what made hu…

>Doesn't it though. Someone from the 1800s would probably absolutely think it does.

Convolutional networks and neural nets in general are cool, but hardly magical. It’s just glorified curve-fitting. A person from the 1800’s would not be all that impressed with the idea. (What’s impressive is the bread-and-butter of it... namely, the technology that enables the millions of simple calculations per millisecond.)

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#398

Post by michaelmrose » Mon, Jul 13, 2020, 5:38 AM UTC

lurquer wrote: post #396

michaelmrose wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think computation as a model of cognition is a perfectly reasonable hypothesis that will bear fruit and at least it IS a hypothesis instead of hand waving. It is worse to imagine that there is a physical process that exists wholly in the physical world that happens in the world within reasonable parameters cannot possibly be engineered to happen in a controlled fashion. This is a proof that would require a major sh…

It is worthwhile to pursue artificial cognition. Just as it was worthwhile to pursue manned flight. The difference, though, is that the Wright Brothers were never foolish enough to arrogantly say a bird is actually a type of airplane...

A bird is a mechanical device to achieve heavier than air flight.

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#399

Post by axilmar » Mon, Jul 13, 2020, 9:54 AM UTC

In 80 years we have gone from nothing to deep learning.

In the next 80 years, we will have AGI, and in the next 8000 years humans will be androids/cyborgs.

That we haven't managed to create true AGI for now doesn't mean anything. It's like the case for the aeroplane: there were even mathematicians that "proved" things heavier than the air cannot fly.

Re: Why general artificial intelligence will not be realized

#400

Post by Thiez » Mon, Jul 13, 2020, 5:03 PM UTC

codr7 wrote: post #332

simonh wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Way to change the goal posts. We built a machine than learned how to walk. Mission accomplished. The assertion in the article was either wrong or irrelevant, pick one. Then a bald assertion, computers will never X. Says you. Just because we’re not there yet is no proof it’s impossible.

My son learned how to stand up at 8 months, pretty soon he was walking and even running. No one had to teach him anything, he did this by observing the world around him and drawing his own conclusions. This is not about definitions, since we don't even know what exactly we're chasing there are no ways to express the difference unambigously. What we get instead is one side trying to (unsuccessfully) define the differe…

Cows can walk minutes after they are born. I guess they're even smarter. You might argue that the walking calf is not intelligent because it came preprogrammed to walk, but human babies will reflexively start making stepping movements when you hold them upright and let their feet touch the ground. I think it's ridiculous to argue that your son somehow learned to walk through observation and reasoning alone.