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Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

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Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#91

Post by mrfusion »

eemax wrote: post #26
idlewords wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The place where AI alarmists seem to forget this most often is in computational complexity, and particularly in the power of super-hyper-computers to simulate reality. Bostrom in particular doesn't seem to appreciate the constraints complexity theory puts on what an AI could calculate (unless he thinks P=NP).

Here's a response about why complexity theory may not constrain AI that much: https://www.gwern.net/Complexity%20vs%20AI It is something "AI alarmists" think about.

What's his reason? I got halfway through that and realized I didn't understand.

Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#92

Post by thedufer »

colechristensen wrote: post #42
TillE wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just vitalism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitalism Either everything exists in the material world, or it doesn't. There's really no way of avoiding that binary. If you think there's something else, that is by definition supernatural.

There's no reason that something else can't exist in the material world, I think the parent is just pointing out the third way is thinking there's something else material outside our current understanding. If God exists, there's no reason there couldn't be new phyisics describing how his world works.

If the something else is physical but outside of our current understanding, then it doesn't prevent us from creating AI by simply simulating a biological brain. Thus, that is the same as the physicalist view in the context of the argument in question.

Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#93

Post by [deleted] »

mrob wrote: post #57

Wooly Definitions: The only definition that matters is ability to make correct predictions about the future. All other things called "intelligence" are a consequence of this. This definition is formalized with AIXI, which is uncomputable, but computable approximations exist. Hawking's Cat, Einstein's Cat: Scams require some intelligence from the victim. The victim needs to mistakenly believe they're doing something s…

[deleted]

Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#94

Post by goatlover »

TillE wrote: post #33
md224 wrote: post #27

"Put another way, this is the premise that the mind arises out of ordinary physics... If you are very religious, you might believe that a brain is not possible without a soul. But for most of us, this is an easy premise to accept." The thing that irks me about this is how it reinforces a common (and in my opinion, false) dichotomy: either you believe the mind is explicable in terms of ordinary physics or you believe…

That's just vitalism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitalism Either everything exists in the material world, or it doesn't. There's really no way of avoiding that binary. If you think there's something else, that is by definition supernatural.

It's not at all binary. Read some more philosophy. Materialism hardly encompasses all the non-supernatural views. First of all, the world could be mathematical, informational, computational, or a simulation. It could have universals in addition to material particulars.

Consciousness might not be reducible to the material, or the material could all have a conscious component. There might be other things, like societies or biology, which are strongly emergent. Or maybe there is no material world. Maybe it's all mental. Perhaps there is a third substance, a neutral monism giving rise to mind and matter.

Maybe the noumena is beyond human categorization and perception. Perhaps our experience of the world is such because we are the animals we are, and not because we have access to reality in itself. Man is the measure and all that.

And on and on. There are various anti-realists debates. There is Humean skepticism of causality. None of these issues need invoke the supernatural, although they don't necessarily rule it out. David Chalmers can propose consciousness as an additional feature of nature which is nonphysical (tied to informationally rich processes like certain mental or computational states), without proposing any supernatural element.

Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#95

Post by idlewords »

k8t wrote: post #72

Let's take a step back and look at the meta-level. So there's maybe a chance AI is extremely dangerous (as in wipes humanity out), and there's a chance that AI might not be dangerous. There are arguments between how likely each choice is. But the more important fact is that since there's so much at stake (all of humanity), we should likely be really really really sure about things. For example, let's say you live in…

The problem with this precautionary reasoning is it leads you to Pascal's Mugging, where you are ready to believe very unlikely things because of the enormous impact they'll have if true.

Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#96

Post by argonaut »

k8t wrote: post #72

Let's take a step back and look at the meta-level. So there's maybe a chance AI is extremely dangerous (as in wipes humanity out), and there's a chance that AI might not be dangerous. There are arguments between how likely each choice is. But the more important fact is that since there's so much at stake (all of humanity), we should likely be really really really sure about things. For example, let's say you live in…

"If there's a 1% chance that Pakistani scientists are helping al-Qaeda build or develop a nuclear weapon, we have to treat it as a certainty in terms of our response. It's not about our analysis ... It's about our response."

- Dick Cheney

Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#97

Post by 1_2__3 »

TillE wrote: post #33
md224 wrote: post #27

"Put another way, this is the premise that the mind arises out of ordinary physics... If you are very religious, you might believe that a brain is not possible without a soul. But for most of us, this is an easy premise to accept." The thing that irks me about this is how it reinforces a common (and in my opinion, false) dichotomy: either you believe the mind is explicable in terms of ordinary physics or you believe…

That's just vitalism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitalism Either everything exists in the material world, or it doesn't. There's really no way of avoiding that binary. If you think there's something else, that is by definition supernatural.

But doesn't our understanding of what is natural and what is supernatural - where the line between them lies - evolving constantly? Is it vitalism (or some other investment in the supernatural) to believe that what constitutes the material world is not yet fully explored or understood, and that the answers to some of our questions on humanity and consciousness will be found there?

Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#98

Post by goatlover »

JamilD wrote: post #54
md224 wrote: post #27

"Put another way, this is the premise that the mind arises out of ordinary physics... If you are very religious, you might believe that a brain is not possible without a soul. But for most of us, this is an easy premise to accept." The thing that irks me about this is how it reinforces a common (and in my opinion, false) dichotomy: either you believe the mind is explicable in terms of ordinary physics or you believe…

The roundworm (c. elegans) only has 302 neurons, and about 7,000 synapses, but is capable of social behavior, movement, and reproduction. The entire connectome has been mapped, and we understand how many of these behaviors work without having to resort to additional ontological entities like your "third way". If this complex behavior can be explained using only 302 neurons, I have no doubt that the complexity of huma…

But it can't all be explained just using neurons. Those neurons exist as part of a body. That body lives in an environment. Those environments include other people. You can't understand the totality human behavior without including bodies and environments. It can't all be reduced to neuroscience.

It's true for the worm as well. You can't understand everything about the worm without emulating the other 600 or so cells, and putting it into environments similar to what biological worms occupy. The lego mindstorm worm is interesting, but it's hardly the natural state of the worm.

Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#99

Post by idlewords »

zaroth wrote: post #80

I feel like this essay is missing a key point around defining intelligence. Machines can be trained to emulate intelligence, but machines are not themselves intelligent. Our neural nets can drive cars, convert speech to text, recognize images, and maybe even carry on a conversation. But there's no light behind the eyes. It's all synthetic. It's an emulation which mimes intelligence through the brute force of observin…

There's a longstanding philosophical argument about this. Google 'Searle's Chinese Room'.

Re: Superintelligence: The Idea That Eats Smart People

#100

Post by aaachilless »

idlewords wrote: post #56
apsec112 wrote: post #29

"Not many people know that Einstein was a burly, muscular fellow. But if Einstein tried to get a cat in a carrier, and the cat didn't want to go, you know what would happen to Einstein. He would have to resort to a brute-force solution that has nothing to do with intelligence, and in that matchup the cat could do pretty well for itself." This seems, actually, like a perfect argument going in the other direction. Ever…

I'm not arguing that it's useless to outsmart a cat. I'm disputing the assumption that being vastly smarter means your opponent is hopelessly outmatched and at your mercy. If you're the first human on an island full of tigers, you're not going to end up as the Tiger King.

What if you're the first human on an island full of baby tigers? I think most AI alarmists would argue that this analogy is vastly more appropriate.
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