Mike, list I fully agree with you.
AI , to my understanding, operates within the inductive process [Secondness]. In this manner, it can outperform the human inductive capacity simply because it doesn’t operate as ONE individual but as ’the whole population’..and thus, has immediate access to all [recorded] data. It operates within the deductive process [ Thirdness] where it can generalize from this inductive data. But- I strongly doubt if it has the capacities for abductive generation [ Firstness] of entirely new forms or concepts. I’d compare the AI processes to the most basic units of matter in the universe - atoms and molecules. Are they capable of abductive processes [ Firstness]? Can an entirely novel atom or chemical molecule be formed? I doubt it - our universe could not operate with such instability. I think we only get abduction [Firstness, ie,freedom, randomness] when matter operates as ‘life’, Here, in particular the more complex life forms - can operate within novelty, and engage in constructive adaptation and evolution, to enable more complex energy processing - but rest within a foundation of stability [3ns and 2ns]. . Edwina > On Dec 17, 2024, at 8:52 PM, Mike Bergman <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hi Gary, > > This is a topic near and dear to me, and one I am very actively investigating > (and using) personally (mostly with ChatGPT 4-o1, but also the latest version > of Grok). My first observation, granted based on my sample of one, is that > abductive reasoning in a Peircean sense is lacking with current LLMs (large > language models), as is true for all general ML or AI approaches. Machine > learning and deep learning have been mostly an inductive process IMO. A major > gap I have seen for quite some time has been the lack of abductive reasoning > in most ML and AI activities of recent vintage. > > This assertion is most evident in the lack of "new" hypothesis generation by > these systems, the critical discriminator that you correctly point out from > Peirce. One can prompt these new chat AIs with new hypotheses, and in that > form, they are very helpful and useful. It is for these reasons that I tend > to treat current chat AIs as dedicated research assistants: able to provide > very useful background legwork, including some answers that stimulate further > questions and thoughts, often in a rapid fire give-and-take manner, but ones > that are not creative in and of themselves aside from making some non-evident > connections. > > I believe that better matching of current chat AIs with Peirce's thinking > (esp abductive reasoning as he defined) is a particularly rich vein for next > generation stuff. Lastly, my own personal view is that the current state of > the art is not "dangerous", but we are also seeing very rapid increases of > what Ilya Sutskever <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilya_Sutskever> calls > "superintelligence", the speed of which is pretty breathtaking. We may be > close to tapping out on this current phase with most Internet content already > captured for training, but like with LLMs, there are certainly new > innovations not yet foreseen that may continue to maintain this Moore's law > <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law>-like pace of improvements. > > Best, Mike > > On 12/17/2024 6:00 PM, Gary Richmond wrote: >> >> List, >> >> In a brief article, "How Does A.I. Think? Here’s One Theory" in the New York >> Times today, Peter Coy, after noting that "Computer scientists are >> continually surprised by the creativity displayed by new generations of >> A.I.," comments on one hypothesis that might help explain that >> 'creativity', namely, that AI is using abduction in its machine reasoning. >> He writes: >> >> One hypothesis for how large language models such as o1 think is that they >> use what logicians call abduction, or abductive reasoning. Deduction is >> reasoning from general laws to specific conclusions. Induction is the >> opposite, reasoning from the specific to the general. >> >> Abduction isn’t as well known, but it’s common in daily life, not to mention >> possibly inside A.I. It’s inferring the most likely explanation for a given >> observation. Unlike deduction, which is a straightforward procedure, and >> induction, which can be purely statistical, abduction requires creativity. >> >> The planet Neptune was discovered through abductive reasoning, when two >> astronomers independently hypothesized that its existence was the most >> likely explanation for perturbations in the orbit of its inner neighbor, >> Uranus. Abduction is also the thought process jurors often use when they >> decide if a defendant is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. >> >> Yet Peirce argues in the 1903 Lectures on Pragmatism that only abduction >> "introduces any new idea" into a scientific inquiry: >> >> " Abduction is the process of forming an explanatory hypothesis. It is the >> only logical operation which introduces any new idea; for induction does >> nothing but determine a value, and deduction merely evolves the necessary >> consequences of a pure hypothesis." >> >> I had always thought of abduction as the unique domain of the individual >> scientist, the creative genius (say, Newton or Einstein) who, fully versed >> in the most important relevant findings in his field, retroductively >> connects those pieces of scientific information to posit a testable >> hypothesis concerning an unresolved question in science. >> >> But it makes sense that an AI program employing large data bases might >> indeed be able to 'scan' those huge, multitudinous bases, connect the >> salient information, and posit an hypothesis (or some other abductive idea). >> >> Any thoughts on this? For example: Is it potentially a valuable feature and >> power of AI and, thus, for us (the use of AI in medical research would tend >> to support this view)? Is it a potential danger to us (some AI programs have >> been seen to lie, to 'hide' some findings, etc.; might this get out of >> control)? If AI can create testable hypotheses, is the role of the >> 'creative' scientist jeopardized? >> >> Best,' >> >> Gary R >> >> >> >> >> _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ >> ARISBE: THE PEIRCE GATEWAY is now at >> https://cspeirce.com <https://cspeirce.com/> and, just as well, at >> https://www.cspeirce.com <https://www.cspeirce.com/> . It'll take a while >> to repair / update all the links! >> ► PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON >> PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to >> [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> . >> ► To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message NOT to PEIRCE-L but to [email protected] >> <mailto:[email protected]> with UNSUBSCRIBE PEIRCE-L in the SUBJECT LINE >> of the message and nothing in the body. More at >> https://list.iupui.edu/sympa/help/user-signoff.html . >> ► PEIRCE-L is owned by THE PEIRCE GROUP; moderated by Gary Richmond; and >> co-managed by him and Ben Udell. > -- > __________________________________________ > > Michael K. Bergman > 319.621.5225 > http://mkbergman.com <http://mkbergman.com/> > http://www.linkedin.com/in/mkbergman > __________________________________________ > _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ > ARISBE: THE PEIRCE GATEWAY is now at > https://cspeirce.com and, just as well, at > https://www.cspeirce.com . It'll take a while to repair / update all the > links! > ► PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON > PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to [email protected] > . > ► To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message NOT to PEIRCE-L but to [email protected] > with UNSUBSCRIBE PEIRCE-L in the SUBJECT LINE of the message and nothing in > the body. More at https://list.iupui.edu/sympa/help/user-signoff.html . > ► PEIRCE-L is owned by THE PEIRCE GROUP; moderated by Gary Richmond; and > co-managed by him and Ben Udell.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ARISBE: THE PEIRCE GATEWAY is now at https://cspeirce.com and, just as well, at https://www.cspeirce.com . It'll take a while to repair / update all the links! ► PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to [email protected] . ► To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message NOT to PEIRCE-L but to [email protected] with UNSUBSCRIBE PEIRCE-L in the SUBJECT LINE of the message and nothing in the body. More at https://list.iupui.edu/sympa/help/user-signoff.html . ► PEIRCE-L is owned by THE PEIRCE GROUP; moderated by Gary Richmond; and co-managed by him and Ben Udell.
