Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#21

Post by _rpd » Wed, Mar 31, 2021, 1:39 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #19

_rpd wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once you have an AI with a human approximate general intelligence, the ability to instantiate it thousands of times and/or run it at thousands of times 'baseline' speed to explore a problem space is going to look like a big IQ boost.

9 pregnant women can't produce a baby in 1 month.

I don’t think this analogy is helpful. If an IQ 110 AI can research 10^6 person-hours for each IQ 110 person-hour, the results are going to look like a qualitative difference (i.e., higher IQ). That said, I do think that some problem spaces require ‘true’ IQ advances to address - insight vs. bruteforce.

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#22

Post by bopbeepboop » Wed, Mar 31, 2021, 2:23 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #18

bopbeepboop wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Distributed quantum computing is already a thing. An AGI that made a few decades of current-rate scientific progress could switch to a globally distributed quantum computer that’s synchronized in its computation through entanglement. At which point, it would hit an exponential curve until it ran out of space to grow. (The “singularity” proponents argue this is unbounded.) An AI that’s 10x smarter than us would be 2^1…

We need to have the talk: https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-talk-3

You’d be funnier if you quoted what you believe I said that’s incorrect, rather than making nebulous accusations because you didn’t understand or agree with my comment.

Go ahead, get scientific.

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#23

Post by Jeff_Brown » Wed, Mar 31, 2021, 3:01 PM UTC

Jack000 wrote: post #2

Surprised this was written by Ted Chiang (my all-time favorite science-fiction author). The IQ and compiler arguments seem like pretty weak strawmen, and the last section assumes that AI will have some kind of normal distribution of IQ just like humans, which doesn't make any sense. There's no reason to believe that intelligence is a quantity that can be improved ad infinitum ala singularity, but I think it's reasona…

Finitude seems a pretty weak constraint. There's only a finite difference between the intelligence of a paramecium and that of a human. The gap between our intelligence and the theoretical maximum is still, I imagine, unfathomably big.

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#24

Post by staticman2 » Wed, Mar 31, 2021, 4:05 PM UTC

He claims humans can't increase the intelligence of animals, but we probably can?

Dogs probably have higher emotional intelligence (by human standards) than wolves, and we probably could breed dogs (or have we?) that are smarter at basic puzzle solving activities like opening latches with their paws or whatever.

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#25

Post by KlinkEastwood » Wed, Mar 31, 2021, 5:31 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #20

KlinkEastwood wrote: post #15

The only thing I got out of this is the fact that when people say ted Chiang is such a brilliant guy, you have to read his stuff, my mind is going to silently think no he's a sophist hack. Am I the only person who read this and thought my god this person is an idiot but is smart enough to get other people to think he's not an idiot but is actually a genius .

No, but I got the impression that you have a facile understanding of human thinking/creativity, in that you think that a person with bad arguments in X areas must necessarily have bad arguments in other areas, and can't also be a brilliant writer otherwise.

Not bad arguments, stupid ones.

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#26

Post by canadianfella » Wed, Mar 31, 2021, 5:34 PM UTC

Jack000 wrote: post #2

Surprised this was written by Ted Chiang (my all-time favorite science-fiction author). The IQ and compiler arguments seem like pretty weak strawmen, and the last section assumes that AI will have some kind of normal distribution of IQ just like humans, which doesn't make any sense. There's no reason to believe that intelligence is a quantity that can be improved ad infinitum ala singularity, but I think it's reasona…

Agi?

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#27

Post by bopbeepboop » Wed, Mar 31, 2021, 9:46 PM UTC

bopbeepboop wrote: post #4

nine_k wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course there may be a limit to attainable intelligence, at least per physical volume, much like there is a limit to the efficiency of a heat-powered engine. But I'd suppose we're pretty far from that limit yet, if any.

Distributed quantum computing is already a thing. An AGI that made a few decades of current-rate scientific progress could switch to a globally distributed quantum computer that’s synchronized in its computation through entanglement. At which point, it would hit an exponential curve until it ran out of space to grow. (The “singularity” proponents argue this is unbounded.) An AI that’s 10x smarter than us would be 2^1…

The downvoting is hilarious: nobody can actually say what I’m wrong about, and the one person who tried agreed with me, but you’re here downvoting because you’re sure you’re experts.

If you were really smarter than me at QM, you’d be able to point out what was wrong with what I said.

The HN downvotes without correction really speak to the hubris around here.

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#28

Post by nine_k » Thu, Apr 01, 2021, 3:24 AM UTC

bopbeepboop wrote: post #27

bopbeepboop wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Distributed quantum computing is already a thing. An AGI that made a few decades of current-rate scientific progress could switch to a globally distributed quantum computer that’s synchronized in its computation through entanglement. At which point, it would hit an exponential curve until it ran out of space to grow. (The “singularity” proponents argue this is unbounded.) An AI that’s 10x smarter than us would be 2^1…

The downvoting is hilarious: nobody can actually say what I’m wrong about, and the one person who tried agreed with me, but you’re here downvoting because you’re sure you’re experts. If you were really smarter than me at QM, you’d be able to point out what was wrong with what I said. The HN downvotes without correction really speak to the hubris around here.

You are theoretically correct. But we haven't yet attained practical command of the ideas, haven't turned them into technologies. Because of that, any level of detail is about as believable as any sci—fi. In practice, things may end unattainable in the form we currently imagine them, and anything along the lines most likely will not be very similar, except in deepest principles.

We can conservatively say that even though there is a limit to amount of computation produced in a given volume, temperature range, and time, this limit is still sky-high compared to what we do now. OTOH the speed of light is already a major limiting factor.

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#29

Post by AnimalMuppet » Thu, Apr 01, 2021, 3:36 AM UTC

bopbeepboop wrote: post #22

coldtea wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to have the talk: https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-talk-3

You’d be funnier if you quoted what you believe I said that’s incorrect, rather than making nebulous accusations because you didn’t understand or agree with my comment. Go ahead, get scientific.

Why should we get scientific? You didn't. You assumed some stuff, and came up with exponentially self-improving AI. That's not science.

There is no scientific reason why global quantum communication means that an AI hits exponential growth. (If there is, you sure haven't supplied it! You've just asserted that it is so.)

Re: Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter

#30

Post by bopbeepboop » Thu, Apr 01, 2021, 5:53 AM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #28

bopbeepboop wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The downvoting is hilarious: nobody can actually say what I’m wrong about, and the one person who tried agreed with me, but you’re here downvoting because you’re sure you’re experts. If you were really smarter than me at QM, you’d be able to point out what was wrong with what I said. The HN downvotes without correction really speak to the hubris around here.

You are theoretically correct. But we haven't yet attained practical command of the ideas, haven't turned them into technologies. Because of that, any level of detail is about as believable as any sci—fi. In practice, things may end unattainable in the form we currently imagine them, and anything along the lines most likely will not be very similar, except in deepest principles. We can conservatively say that even th…

Sure — as you say though, we’re far off that limit. There’s plenty of room for limited exponential growth in its intelligence.

There’s a number of facts that make this not sci-fi:

- China has demonstrated distributed quantum networks.

- The US has demonstrated distributed quantum calculations.

- Anyons were recently experimentally verified.

- We have a number of small quantum ALU.

- There are quantum-effect systems in production, just not fully-entangled systems.

- We have quantum ML algorithms for accelerated training.

Nobody has disputed my baseline estimate: that humans will complete a quantum computer in 10-20 years. (If people just disagree there, they should say so.)

However, once you accept that, it’s trivial to see the following sequence:

- AI is slightly smarter than humans, does quantum work 2-5x faster.

- AI develops quantum circuits in 2-4 years that would have taken 10-20 for humans. (See COVID vaccines for power of tech acceleration.)

- Those quantum systems let the AI replace its current systems with faster local ones.

- The AI uses another 1-2 years at this intermediate stage to extend current quantum networking research to unify its quantum data centers into a single computer, giving full global entanglement.

So in 3-5 years, an AI which starts off mildly smarter could finish nearly-done projects and enter an exponential growth curve before we do.

That progression looks like:

- Scale M AI.

- Scale M/K * 2^K, where K is the portion of M at a single data center.

- Scale 2^M AI, when it can fully entangle.

> Because of that, any level of detail is about as believable as any sci—fi.

That’s not true: most major companies in the space have labs looking to turn fundamental research into products, which is the exact opposite of sci-fi.

I think people just haven’t actually thought about this and are responding with fallacies rather than confront an idea they intuitively reject.

Even though I’m right on the technical issues involved.