Feral Minds • Hacker News Board

Re: Feral Minds

#11

Post by ilaksh » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 2:08 PM UTC

djoldman wrote: post #4

Unfortunately, the hype about LLMs has generated breathless ruminations on AGI and consciousness. Dig a little deeper and there doesn't seem to be much there, as one may find that these terms are not adequately defined. Here we see this attempt: > First, a disclaimer. Consciousness is a notoriously slippery term, if nonetheless possessed of a certain common-sense quality. In some ways, being conscious just means bein…

It's still a very interesting article. But I think that your point is correct. This article demonstrates why philosophy was largely obsoleted by science.

Re: Feral Minds

#12

Post by bumby » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 2:14 PM UTC

hiAndrewQuinn wrote: post #10

djoldman wrote: post #4

Unfortunately, the hype about LLMs has generated breathless ruminations on AGI and consciousness. Dig a little deeper and there doesn't seem to be much there, as one may find that these terms are not adequately defined. Here we see this attempt: > First, a disclaimer. Consciousness is a notoriously slippery term, if nonetheless possessed of a certain common-sense quality. In some ways, being conscious just means bein…

The only two things I can say with much confidence about consciousness: 1. I definitely have it, some of the time. (I'm not sure if anything else does, but I can't rule it out.) 2. The chances other things have it feels lower as they become more different from me. Another person may or may not have consciousness, and a rock may or may not have consciousness, but the human feels more likely to have it than the rock do…

It may be that the tools we have come to rely on so much to define such terms are, almost by definition, inadequate to to define consciousness. The scientific method and rational discourse are used to describe objective reality; I don't know that they can fully answer the "hard" problem of consciousness because it is largely concerned with subjective reality.

Re: Feral Minds

#13

Post by ilaksh » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 2:31 PM UTC

To reason about this usefully we need to unpack the numerous dimensions of intelligent living beings like humans (many shared with some animals). And realize that although most of them are typically packaged together, they are not all necessarily inextricable.

- Awareness of self versus other.

- Core language for communicating simple information.

- Simple spatial understanding

- More complex spatial reasoning

- Complex language and abstract reasoning.

- "Feeling" anything from a body

- Feeling emotions (arguably tied to embodiment also)

- A constant stream of concentrated focus on relevant sensory or sometimes internal information

- a state pattern that persists through time despite constituent elements being replaced (as in an organism)

- or any tendency of a pattern to persist itself

- etc.

We can categorize these questions into things like living/non-living, different types of cognition, types of embodiment and sensory experience and aggregation/streams/management, etc.

The starting point would ideally be science rather than philosophy. At least for the parts we can use science for, which I suggest is almost all of them, if we properly deconstruct loaded ambiguous terms like "consciousness".

Re: Feral Minds

#14

Post by beezlebroxxxxxx » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 2:31 PM UTC

bumby wrote: post #12

hiAndrewQuinn wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only two things I can say with much confidence about consciousness: 1. I definitely have it, some of the time. (I'm not sure if anything else does, but I can't rule it out.) 2. The chances other things have it feels lower as they become more different from me. Another person may or may not have consciousness, and a rock may or may not have consciousness, but the human feels more likely to have it than the rock do…

It may be that the tools we have come to rely on so much to define such terms are, almost by definition, inadequate to to define consciousness. The scientific method and rational discourse are used to describe objective reality; I don't know that they can fully answer the "hard" problem of consciousness because it is largely concerned with subjective reality.

> It may be that the tools we have come to rely on so much to define such terms are, almost by definition, inadequate to to define consciousness.

And yet, we are confronted by the fact that we use the concept of consciousness in dozens of different contexts and we understand perfectly well (usually) what people are talking about. That's the basic insight of ordinary language philosophy. These aren't fundamental mysteries, they're webs of concepts tied up in language and careful attention to how they are used, un packing the web and knot of uses, reveals what they mean. The definition is a "rule" or explanation for their use in language, which is not "subjective" (private) but public behaviour.

Re: Feral Minds

#15

Post by gnramires » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 2:35 PM UTC

djoldman wrote: post #4

Unfortunately, the hype about LLMs has generated breathless ruminations on AGI and consciousness. Dig a little deeper and there doesn't seem to be much there, as one may find that these terms are not adequately defined. Here we see this attempt: > First, a disclaimer. Consciousness is a notoriously slippery term, if nonetheless possessed of a certain common-sense quality. In some ways, being conscious just means bein…

I think your argument may be a little too strong. Would you refrain from discussing, say, happiness, sadness, etc. in your daily life without a formal definition of what happiness is exactly at a structural level? And I say that as someone interested in formalizing ethics, and formalizing all of those notions. The point is, to even (ideally, formally) define them we need intuition and intuitive discussions about what their definitions should be, and we are still at (very) early stages of what could constitute a real formalization.[1]

More significantly, the utility of those concepts far precludes scientific definitions, those terms have been useful for thousands of years, and are essential to human society!

(Again, certainly not against definition, but be mindful of being too strict, too soon about it :) )

[1] The benefits of formalizing (human concepts) are subtle: like formalization in math, they help us build confidence that we're not building sand castle, dig deeper into theories of meaning, and use this to slowly improve lives of everyone. But like math, we've been doing it informally for very long, and a strict axiomatic formalization is still today relatively rare (although progressing with the aid of computer proof systems) for most fields. Still, the evolving standards for proof are likely essential for many of the deep theories we've achieved (probably including say modern logic and Godel's theories, algebraic geometry, functional analysis, etc.).

Re: Feral Minds

#16

Post by hiAndrewQuinn » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 2:47 PM UTC

beezlebroxxxxxx wrote: post #14

bumby wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be that the tools we have come to rely on so much to define such terms are, almost by definition, inadequate to to define consciousness. The scientific method and rational discourse are used to describe objective reality; I don't know that they can fully answer the "hard" problem of consciousness because it is largely concerned with subjective reality.

> It may be that the tools we have come to rely on so much to define such terms are, almost by definition, inadequate to to define consciousness. And yet, we are confronted by the fact that we use the concept of consciousness in dozens of different contexts and we understand perfectly well (usually) what people are talking about. That's the basic insight of ordinary language philosophy. These aren't fundamental myste…

Mm, I'm still on the "by definition inadequate" side personally. I just don't see any unambiguous way to verify that another being even experiences qualia, to say nothing of actual consciousness.

Re: Feral Minds

#17

Post by netcan » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 2:51 PM UTC

djoldman wrote: post #4

Unfortunately, the hype about LLMs has generated breathless ruminations on AGI and consciousness. Dig a little deeper and there doesn't seem to be much there, as one may find that these terms are not adequately defined. Here we see this attempt: > First, a disclaimer. Consciousness is a notoriously slippery term, if nonetheless possessed of a certain common-sense quality. In some ways, being conscious just means bein…

>One might say who cares if they don't define it? Well, if you don't define it, there's no point in discussing whether it exists, how it came to be, or what it comprises.

> You might as well be asking the question: how close are we to quidlesmoopy?

Adequately, and generally defining intelligence, consiousness, AGI & such... big ask. Impossible in practice.

So... dies that mean the conversation ends here because any further discussion = quidlesmoopy? We don't know what intelligence is precisely and therefore can't reason about it at all.

I don't think this level of minimalism or skepticism is viable.

We need to make do with placeholder definitions, descriptions and theories of consciousness and intelligence. We can work with that.

So yes... language as a foundation for conciousness, intelligence is "just a theory." Its probably not entirely correct. And still... positing and testing the theory by building and artificial talking machines is possible.

Re: Feral Minds

#18

Post by simiones » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 3:01 PM UTC

djoldman wrote: post #4

Unfortunately, the hype about LLMs has generated breathless ruminations on AGI and consciousness. Dig a little deeper and there doesn't seem to be much there, as one may find that these terms are not adequately defined. Here we see this attempt: > First, a disclaimer. Consciousness is a notoriously slippery term, if nonetheless possessed of a certain common-sense quality. In some ways, being conscious just means bein…

> One might say who cares if they don't define it? Well, if you don't define it, there's no point in discussing whether it exists, how it came to be, or what it comprises.

This is not how we normally treat other concepts, even in physics or mathematics. Concepts can exist and even be studied for a long time while lacking a rigorous definition.

For example, a truly rigorous and satisfying definition of natural numbers probably dates from the 19th century. Does that mean that people before this shouldn't have discussed natural numbers? For another example, the Dirac delta function was used in the study and teaching of QM while not being very well defined as a mathematical object (it's not an actual function, for example).

In general, most interesting concepts begin life as some kind of vague intuition, and it often takes significant study to create a formal definition that captures the intuition well. This applies to any kinds of concepts, even in mathematics.

Re: Feral Minds

#19

Post by 082349872349872 » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 3:41 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #6

082349872349872 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a definition of consciousness: consciousness arises when a creature not only applies a theory of mind to others (predators, prey, and its conspecifics would all be likely others) but also applies a theory of mind to itself. (given that we have the most data on ourselves, it is not surprising that we'd have an "I", but it is a little surprising that the "I" modelled usually has such a high variance from others'…

Great (although that's a hypothesis for a cause rather than a definition), but for any discussion with another person, you have to be sure in advance that they don't use one of the other 49 common meanings of "consciousness". What I care about when I ask if an AI is or isn't conscious, is if it has the kind of experiences of existing that I know I have. Why is there a feeling of sensations rather than just the sensat…

How do we know that other H sapiens have the same kind of experiences of existing as you have? Best I can do is that "I know, right?" is a fairly universal reaction, so we know that even if others' qualia are not identical to ours, they are at least isomorphic.

As to "more than mere stimulus-response", much of me is pretty basic stimulus-response. Certainly the derivative controller, and arguably all the proportional controller as well. It's only the integral controller that's not, and much of that could be adequately explained by an FSM with a high number of states. (it is a little known fact that Regexen were originally derived as a mathematical model of what neural networks could potentially recognise!)

(see https://thefarside.net/i/61ee3cb4 infra)

Re: Feral Minds

#20

Post by bumby » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 3:43 PM UTC

beezlebroxxxxxx wrote: post #14

bumby wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be that the tools we have come to rely on so much to define such terms are, almost by definition, inadequate to to define consciousness. The scientific method and rational discourse are used to describe objective reality; I don't know that they can fully answer the "hard" problem of consciousness because it is largely concerned with subjective reality.

> It may be that the tools we have come to rely on so much to define such terms are, almost by definition, inadequate to to define consciousness. And yet, we are confronted by the fact that we use the concept of consciousness in dozens of different contexts and we understand perfectly well (usually) what people are talking about. That's the basic insight of ordinary language philosophy. These aren't fundamental myste…

I think the crux of it is how the OP was talking about making claims "with confidence".

I think you're saying we can get a general sense of what is meant without a formal definition. That's a fuzzy definition; i.e., one with high uncertainty/low confidence. My point is that I don't know that we have the tools to make high-confidence claims. We can't even agree on when consciousness starts, whether it's a toggle switch or a dimmer switch etc. That all speaks to high levels of uncertainty, where we can't agree on a "public" language. I think the limits of language to describe the phenomena is right in line with the "we don't have the right tools" argument.