211–220 of 222 posts
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Yup! We're here and looking to do good work with Cultural Heritage and Research Organizations in Europe. I'm very happy to be working with the Internet Archive once again after a 20 year long break. https://www.stichtinginternetarchive.nl/
What kind of volunteer help can the community do?
Brewster is giving a speech on Tuesday March 18 at the University of Leiden. Not sure if you're in Europe, or in the Netherlands, but we're here.
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Yup! We're here and looking to do good work with Cultural Heritage and Research Organizations in Europe. I'm very happy to be working with the Internet Archive once again after a 20 year long break. https://www.stichtinginternetarchive.nl/
Congratulations!
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And I'd love to see data compression terminology get an overhaul. Do we need big LLMs or just succinct data structures? Or maybe "compact" would be good enough? (Yeah LLMs are cool but why not just, you know, losslessly compress the actual data in a way that lets us query its content?)
Well the obvious answer is that LLMs are more then just pure search. They can synthesize novel information from their learned knowledge.
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I want to apologize for this joke in advance. It had to be done. We could take a page from Trump’s book and call them “Beautiful” LLMs. Then we’d have “Big Beautiful LLMs” or just “BBLs” for short. Surely that wouldn’t cause any confusion when Googling.
Weirdly enough, the ITU already chose the superlative for the bigliest radio frequency band to be Tremendous: - Extremely Low Frequency (ELF) - Super Low Frequency (SLF) - Ultra Low Frequency (ULF) - Very Low Frequency (VLF) - Low Frequency (LF) - Medium Frequency (MF) - High Frequency (HF) - Very High Frequency (VHF) - Ultra High Frequency (UHF) - Super High Frequency (SHF) - Extremely High Frequency (EHF) - Tremend…
Horrendous being based on the Latin root for "trembling with fear", tremendous on another Latin root meaning "shaking from excitement" and terrible deriving from a Greek root for, again, "trembling with fear".
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Intelligence is closely related to the concept of attractiveness and gravitas. You say it depends on the agent. I say it's in the eye of the beholder. People aren't very good at explaining what attracts them either. The closest thing we have to a definition for intelligence is probably the LLMs themselves. They're very good at predicting words that attract people. So clearly we've figured it out. It's just such a sha…
> Intelligence is closely related to the concept of attractiveness and gravitas. Interesting. I wonder why you make this connection. Do you know? Your choice of definition seems to be what I would call "perception of intelligence". But why add that extra layer of indirection; why require an observer? I claim this extra level of indirection is not necessary. I eschew definitions with unnecessary complexity (a.k.a "acc…
You're don't like pirates? You're either in the Navy or grandstanding. People love pirates and even killers. But only if they're successful. Otherwise One Piece wouldn't be the most popular manga of all time.
Achieving goals? Why not define it as making predictions? What makes science science? The ability to make predictions. What does the brain organ and neural networks do? They model the world to make predictions. So there you have it.
This whole conversation has been about reducing intelligence to its defining component. So I propose this answer to your question. Take all the things you consider intelligent, and order them topologically. Then define intelligence as whatever thing comes out on top. Achieving goals depends on the ability to make predictions. Therefore it's a better candidate for defining intelligence.
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> Intelligence is closely related to the concept of attractiveness and gravitas. Interesting. I wonder why you make this connection. Do you know? Your choice of definition seems to be what I would call "perception of intelligence". But why add that extra layer of indirection; why require an observer? I claim this extra level of indirection is not necessary. I eschew definitions with unnecessary complexity (a.k.a "acc…
Intelligence is an amalgamation of things. I read somewhere once that scientists tried to figure out which gene is the high IQ gene and found many contributed. It isn't a well defined game like chess. Being good at chess is to intelligence like having great legs might be to attractiveness. You're don't like pirates? You're either in the Navy or grandstanding. People love pirates and even killers. But only if they're…
Not really, but I can see why you might say this. Neither Russell nor I are attempting to define "the one component" of intelligence -- we're saying that there is no single kind of intelligence. Only when one defines a particular (agent, environment, goal) triple can one can start to analyze it statistically and tease apart the related factors. You and I agree that the result will be multifaceted.
I wouldn't say I'm trying to "reduce" anything. I would say I've been attempting to explain a general definition of intelligence that works for a wide variety of types of intelligence. The goal is to reduce unnecessary confusion about it. It simply requires taking some extra time to spell out the (agent, environment, goal).
Once people get specific about a particular triple, then we have a foundation and can start to talk about patterns across different triples. If one is so inclined, we can try to generalize across all intelligent behavior, but frankly, only a tiny fraction of people have put in the requisite thought to do this rigorously. Instead, many people latch onto one particular form of intelligence (e.g. abstract problem solving or "creativity" or whatever) and hoist these preferred qualities into their definition. This is the tail wagging the dog in my opinion. But this is another topic.
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> Intelligence is closely related to the concept of attractiveness and gravitas. Interesting. I wonder why you make this connection. Do you know? Your choice of definition seems to be what I would call "perception of intelligence". But why add that extra layer of indirection; why require an observer? I claim this extra level of indirection is not necessary. I eschew definitions with unnecessary complexity (a.k.a "acc…
Intelligence is an amalgamation of things. I read somewhere once that scientists tried to figure out which gene is the high IQ gene and found many contributed. It isn't a well defined game like chess. Being good at chess is to intelligence like having great legs might be to attractiveness. You're don't like pirates? You're either in the Navy or grandstanding. People love pirates and even killers. But only if they're…
Because "achieving goals" subsumes "making predictions". Remember, Russell's goal is to find a definition of intelligence that is broader than humans -- and even broader than sentient beings. But using the "achieving goals" definition, one can include system that accomplishes goals, even if we can't find any way to verify it is making predictions. For example, even a purely reactive agent (e.g. operating on instincts) can display intelligent behavior if its actions serve its purposes.
If you are seeking one clear point of view about the nature of intelligence, I highly recommend Russell's writing. You don't have to "agree" with his definition, especially not at first, but if you give it a fair reading, you'll probably find it to be coherent and useful for the purposes he layes out.
Russell has been thinking about and teaching these topics for probably 40+ years in depth. So it is sensible to give his ideas serious consideration. Also, there are scholars who disagree with Russell's definition or accentuate different aspects. Wherever a person lands, these various scholars provide a clear foundation that is all too often lacking in everyday conversation.
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Anyone who takes even an hour to audit anything about the Internet Archive will soon come to a very sad conclusion. The physical assets are stored in the blast radius of an oil refinery. They don't have air conditioning. Take the tour and they tell you the site runs slower on hot days. Great mission, but atrociously managed. Under attack for a number of reasons, mostly absurd. But a few are painfully valid.
How significant is "in the blast radius of an oil refinery"? Once every how many years should I expect a typical oil refinery to explode? This really doesn't seem like it should be their first, second, fifth, or twelfth priority to"solve". EDIT: asking Claude: Based on historical data, major refinery explosions in developed countries might occur at a rate of approximately 1 in 1,000 to 1 in 2,000 refinery-years of op…
- 1989 explosion and fire
- 1999 explosion and fire
- 2012 fire
The 2012 incident sent 15,000 people to the hospital.