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AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

#51

Post by al45tair »

mkl wrote: post #33

The physics of our brains can in principle be simulated at a subatomic quantum level mathematically, even on a classical computer. It would be absurdly expensive and slow with current technology, but it is mathematically possible. Therefore our own generally intelligent brains can be considered a counterexample. I think for your theory to hold up, you would need to show that physics cannot, even in principle, be simu…

And even if OP could show that physics couldn’t be simulated, it still wouldn’t follow that AGI was impossible, or even that it couldn’t be achieved by approximating the simulation that was proved to be impossible to do accurately.

AGI is clearly possible, because our brains are fundamentally machines, and there’s no reason in principle why we couldn’t build something similar. Right now we don’t - as human beings - have the ability to do that, but it clearly isn’t impossible since cellular machinery is able to build it in the first place.

Re: AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

#52

Post by baq »

Veen wrote: post #17
baq wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It follows that it doesn’t. In practical terms, the result doesn’t matter. The race to approximate the human thought process and call it AGI (which is what matters economically) is on. If you can approximate it meaningfully faster that the real brain works in meatspace, you are winning. What it will mean for humanity or civilization is an open question.

That's one possible inference. However, it would also be consistent to claim that there is a fundamentally uncomputable and impossible-to-artificially-replicate "mechanism" underlying human intelligence.

My inner philosopher agrees. My inner engineer doesn’t care; a good enough approximation will suffice.

Re: AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

#53

Post by kamaal »

mindcrime wrote: post #25

AGI Is Mathematically Impossible Unless you believe in magic, the human brain proves that human level general intelligence is possible in our physical universe, running on a system based on the laws of said physical universe. Given that, there's no particular reason to think that "what the brain does" OR a reasonably close approximation, can't be done on another "system based on the laws of our physical universe." Al…

>>Unless you believe in magic, the human brain proves that human level general intelligence is possible in our physical universe, running on a system based on the laws of said physical universe.

Using your analogy, what this means is, we have to make humans to make human like intelligence. Not that we can make human like intelligence out side of humans.

>>Given that, there's no particular reason to think that "what the brain does" OR a reasonably close approximation, can't be done on another "system based on the laws of our physical universe."

What exactly does the brain do? Part of the problems with this is language itself might be insufficient to describe intelligence. And Language might be working a level below our thought. There are occasions where even the best of us fail to come up with how we think. We can go close and its not enough. A picture is better than a thousand words - why? Perhaps language is enough to display signs of intelligence but can't entirely contain or describe it.

Similarly, even in the case of LLMs we have seen showing spatial intelligence is whole lot different than predicting text.

Heck intelligence might not even be one monolithic thing. It could be a collection of several intelligences. And this whole idea of one grand AGI monolith could be wrong.

Re: AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

#54

Post by motorest »

he0001 wrote: post #32
motorest wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You might want to check out the works of that buzzkill that Gödel is ^^ Please explain why do you believe this is relevant to the points I've made.

It argues of “impossibilities” and also proves it.

I think you need to read it again.

Re: AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

#56

Post by effed3 »

Probably every intelligence has its limits, as every systems (eg. mathematics, remembering goedel) has his own. This kind of AGI seems like a deity, hard to belive it's possible, but in pratice many kind of "smaller" intelligences exist (from ants to primates) less "general" but enough to solve enough problems to live and evolve, and maybe can be even created by others intelligences. IMHO It's reasonable to think a real intelligence as a property of complex evolving systems interacting with a complex environment, so to live in a complex world a not-so-general intelligence can be enough, even given some limits and errors.

Re: AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

#57

Post by edanm »

seu wrote: post #42
mindcrime wrote: post #25

AGI Is Mathematically Impossible Unless you believe in magic, the human brain proves that human level general intelligence is possible in our physical universe, running on a system based on the laws of said physical universe. Given that, there's no particular reason to think that "what the brain does" OR a reasonably close approximation, can't be done on another "system based on the laws of our physical universe." Al…

> another "system based on the laws of our physical universe." Since when is mathematics based on the laws of our physical universe? last time I checked, it's an abstract system with no material reality.

Either humans are not generally intelligent, or they are, in which case they're an existence proof of general intelligence. Math really has nothing to do with it beyond the most basic statements of logic.

Re: AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

#58

Post by jhanschoo »

> This is cognition at its weirdest: solving problems somewhat by accident, finding answers in the wrong place, connecting dots that aren’t even in the same picture.

If you solve a problem "by accident", there are very many other people who make foolish decisions daily because they do not think. Some of those pan out too and lead to understanding. A resource-bounded agent can also maintain a notion of fuel and give a random answer when it has exhausted its fuel.

The structural incompleteness mentioned isn't really meaningful. Humans have not demonstrated the capacity to make epsilon-optimal decisions on an infinite number of tasks, since we do not do an infinite number of tasks anyway.

K-complexity, and resource-bounded K-complexity are indeed extremely useful tools to talk about generalization, I'd agree, but I think the author has misunderstood the limits that K-complexity places on generalization.

Re: AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

#59

Post by aetherson »

DragonStrength wrote: post #43
aetherson wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to argue for a fundamentally non-material mind (ie, that human cognition happens in a physically impossible, spiritual plane), then cool. Though you might want to give some consideration to how much it seems like physical processes on the brain can demonstrably affect cognition. If you aren't arguing for a non-materialist position, then the distinction between "artificial" and human intelligence isn't mea…

There's no reason to assume our current pursuit is not a dead end for any number of reasons we do not yet understand. There is a lot of faith we are capturing the same thing based on perceptions, which have a lot to do with the individual observer. It seems very important to some folks that our natural process is a mirror of what our technology does. The same result does not mean it is the same process or anything ot…

"Current LLMs are not going to get to AGI" is a different and much weaker claim than "AGI is mathematically impossible."

Re: AGI Is Mathematically Impossible (3): Kolmogorov Complexity

#60

Post by chrsw »

Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote: post #45
chrsw wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Human intelligence is not general intelligence. If it were, you'd be able to use your conscious thoughts to fight off diseases and you wouldn't need your immune system, for example. The problem I see isn't that AGI isn't possible, that's not even surprising. The problem is the term "AGI" caught on when people really meant "AHI" or artificial _human_ intelligence, which is fundamentally distinct from AGI. AGI is diffi…

> Human intelligence is not general intelligence. If it were, you'd be able to use your conscious thoughts to fight off diseases and you wouldn't need your immune system, for example. The above is nonsense. Mostly because we actually do use our conscious thoughts to fight disease when our immune system can't. That's what medical science is for. We used our intelligence to figure out antibiotics, for example. The broa…

> Mostly because we actually do use our conscious thoughts to fight disease when our immune system can't.

I think in some sense you're right. There's a higher level way to address disease that humans have made progress on.

But in the critical sense more related to the point I was making I completely disagree. The sense I'm speaking of is we do not (maybe one day we well) directly affect disease states without our brains the way our immune system does. It's a very complicated process that we know works but we absolutely do not understand all the mechanisms involved like we do with say, solving a calculus equation.

My point is, if we could do this our central nervous system would also be the immune system. But it is not because it operates in a entirely different cognitive space than our conscious brain. There are many examples of this, like regulating your body's blood sugar. We know the endocrine system is doing this but we are not actively involved in say the way we are when speaking to one another. The examples are actually countless and go far behind what the human cognitive system is currently capable of. AGI, by definition, would have to not only encompass intelligence in all these different cognitive spaces but also encompass intelligence in any arbitrary future space.

> The broadly accepted meaning of AGI is human intelligence on a machine.

Then the name is inaccurate to the point of deception. You've just described artificial human intelligence, not artificial general intelligence.

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