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Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

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Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#141
Some of the comparisons here in the comments between LLMs and the human brain go into the territory of deep naval gazing and abstract justification. To use a phrase mentioned below, by Sagan "You can make an apple pie from scratch, but you'd have to invent the universe first". Sure, to the deepest level this may be somewhat true, but the apple pie would still just be an apple pie, and not a condensed version of all that the universe contains.

The same applies to LLMs in a way. If you calculate their capabilities to some arbitrary extreme of back--end inputs and ability based on the humans building them and all that they can do, you can arrive at a whole range of results for how capable and energy-efficient they are, but it wouldn't change the fact that the human brain as its own device does enormously more with much less energy than any LLM currently in existence. Our evolutionary path to that ability is secondary to it, since it's not a direct part of the brain's material resources in any given context.

The contortions by some to give equivalency between human brains and LLMs are absurd when the very blatantly obvious reality is that our brains are absurdly more powerful. They're also of course capable of self-directed, self-aware cognition, which by now nobody in their rational mind should be ascribing to any LLM.

Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never said kids play like that. I do. As an adult, I find it fun and enjoyable to seek out sunsets I find the colors beautiful. I readily hike mountains just to enjoy a sunset. I watch a sunset and then go party till 3 am, so maybe it's got to do with finding a nice place to sleep, or maybe it's just nice that we have the ability to appreciate phenomenon without having to apply some rigorous concept to it. I'd fly…

Doing enjoyable things isn't "play", it isn't work and you relax but it isn't the same thing as playing. > Personally I think you might be clasping at straws trying to equate every pleasant experience to some type of reward function. No, here I just focus on why play is fun, you tried to pivot to other pleasurable experiences. Unlike watching sunsets basically every animal plays around as kids, that play is therefore…

How can you argue I’m smuggling ”enjoyable” experiences into the argument when you yourself admit play is also Enjoyable. What is the actual difference? Even enjoying a cup of coffee can be considered play if I put the coffee in my mouth and play around and pay careful attention to he aromas a texture.

They’re one and the same thing. It’s a matter of language that makes them appear to be different things. Taking a dip in a pool can be considered play and it can also be pleasurable.

Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#143

There is an immensely strong dogma that, to my best knowledge, is not founded in any science or philosophy: First we must lay down certain axioms (smart word for the common sense/ground rules we all agree upon and accept as true). One of such would be the fact that currently computers do not really understand words. ... The author is at least honest about his assumptions. Which I can appreciate. Most other people jus…

Amusingly, the author does not appear to fully understand the meaning of "axiom".

While practice, axioms are often statements that we all agree on and accept as true, that isn't necessarily true and isn't the core of it's meaning.

Axioms are something we postulate as true, without providing an argument for its truth, for the purposes of making an argument.

In this case, the assertion isn't really used as part of a argument, but to bootstrap an explanation of how words are represented in LLMs.

Edit: I find this so amusing because it is an example of learning a word without understanding it.

Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#144
post #38

There is an immensely strong dogma that, to my best knowledge, is not founded in any science or philosophy: First we must lay down certain axioms (smart word for the common sense/ground rules we all agree upon and accept as true). One of such would be the fact that currently computers do not really understand words. ... The author is at least honest about his assumptions. Which I can appreciate. Most other people jus…

Yeah, for axioms like the above my next question is define 'understand'. Does my dog understand words when it completes specific actions because of what I say? I'm also learning a new language, do I understand a word when I attach a meaning (often a bunch of other words to it) to it? Turns out computers can do this pretty well.

Oh please, enough with the semantics. It reminds me of a post modernist asking me to define what "is" is. The LLM does not understand words in the way a human understands them and that's obvious. Even the creators of LLMs implicitly take this as a given and would rarely openly say they think otherwise no matter how strong the urge to create a more interesting narrative.

Yes, we attach meaning to certain words based on previous experience, but we do so in the context of a conscious awareness of the world around us and our experiences within it. An LLm doesn't even have a notion of self, much less a mechanism for attaching meaning to words and phrases based on conscious reasoning.

Computers can imitate understanding "pretty well" but they have nothing resembling a pretty good or bad or any kind of notion of comprehension about what they're saying.

Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In The Matrix I think people are used as batteries not processors.

That explanation never made any sense to me. Plenty of much easier ways for the machines to generate vastly more energy with far less hassle than using humans as “batteries”. There must be more to it than that!

The original idea wasn't batteries, so they probably started out with humans as cpus but then went with batteries to make it easier to understand for people.

Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doing enjoyable things isn't "play", it isn't work and you relax but it isn't the same thing as playing. > Personally I think you might be clasping at straws trying to equate every pleasant experience to some type of reward function. No, here I just focus on why play is fun, you tried to pivot to other pleasurable experiences. Unlike watching sunsets basically every animal plays around as kids, that play is therefore…

How can you argue I’m smuggling ”enjoyable” experiences into the argument when you yourself admit play is also Enjoyable. What is the actual difference? Even enjoying a cup of coffee can be considered play if I put the coffee in my mouth and play around and pay careful attention to he aromas a texture. They’re one and the same thing. It’s a matter of language that makes them appear to be different things. Taking a di…

> How can you argue I’m smuggling ”enjoyable” experiences into the argument when you yourself admit play is also Enjoyable

Play is enjoyable, not all enjoyable things are play. You started to add other enjoyable things into the argument about play.

> They’re one and the same thing

No they are not. Play is typically seen as what children do, or playing sports, or playing a game, or a competition. You can read the definitions here, none of them say that stuff like eating hotdogs is play unless it is an eating contest or other kind of game:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/play

Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's probably not something you secretly wish when playing, and perhaps for the best (that you don't have fun and enjoy things always with an ulterior motive, except enjoying the experiences). I guess he's saying in the sense of the natural function of play, and we playing is mostly a consequence of the natural function. It's also very much true that we learn a lot, perhaps a significant chunk of what we learn is thr…

I'm conscious I have to types of play though, I'm fully conscious sometimes play can be about learning and training, it's why I ski more difficult terrain than I'm comfortable with, but then I might go eat a massive bowl of pasta and have a glass or three of wine. On an intellectual level, I know there are healthy more rewarding things to eat. I know wine isn't great for me at those quantities. But I consciously make…

Yes, although I say, if you can make your play healthy as well as fun, might as well :)

Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These anthropomorphizations are increasingly absurd. There's a difference between a human making a mistake, and an AI arbitrarily and completely confidently creating entirely new code APIs, legal cases, or whatever that have absolutely no basis in reality whatsoever, beyond being what it thinks would be an appropriate next token based on what you're searching for. These error modes are simply in no way, whatsoever, c…

I mean I can definitely remember lots of cases for myself, in school especially, when I made the same mistake again repeatedly despite being corrected every time. I'm sure today's language models pale in comparison to your flawless genius, but you seriously underestimate the average person's idiocy. Agreed that the lack of some mid tier memory is definitely a huge problem, and the current solutions that try to addres…

It lacks more than memory, it makes the mistake again later even when the previous prompt is in its current token limit.

Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm conscious I have to types of play though, I'm fully conscious sometimes play can be about learning and training, it's why I ski more difficult terrain than I'm comfortable with, but then I might go eat a massive bowl of pasta and have a glass or three of wine. On an intellectual level, I know there are healthy more rewarding things to eat. I know wine isn't great for me at those quantities. But I consciously make…

I don't think that many calls indulging in food or bodily needs "play". Those are just core rewards, play is an active activity that is fun without being directly related to your survival, like eating is.

Eating ice cream instead of stale bread is absolutely play, just like running around on a soccer field is play even though running is a survival skill.

Re: Why your brain is 3 milion more times efficient than GPT-4

#150

I don't care. I've come to the conclusion that gpt and gemini and all the others are nothing but conversational search engines. They can give me ideas or point me in the right direction but so do regular search engines. I like the conversation ability but, in the end, I cannot trust their results and still have to research further to decide for myself if their results are valid.

Just started using Gemini and it has never been correct. Literally not once. It's is just slightly better than a markov chain.
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