Re: Infinitely Unlikely Coincidences [WAS Re: [singularity] AI critique by Jaron Lanier]
On 2/17/08, Stathis Papaioannou [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If computation is multiply realizable, it could be seen as being implemented by an endless variety of physical systems, with the right mapping or interpretation, since anything at all could be arbitrarily chosen to represent a tape, a one, a zero, or whatever. Sure, pretty much anything could be used as a symbol to represent anything else, but the representing would consist in the network of causal interactions that constitute the symbol manipulation, not in the symbols themselves. (And certainly not in anyone having to be around to understand the machinery of symbol manipulation going on.) --- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re : Re : Re : Re : Re : [singularity] Quantum resonance btw DNA strands?
bonjour à tous for info http://xxx.lanl.gov/ftp/arxiv/papers/0802/0802.1835.pdf http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0711/0711.1366v1.pdf cordialement votre bruno - Message d'origine De : Ben Goertzel [EMAIL PROTECTED] À : singularity@v2.listbox.com Envoyé le : Mercredi, 6 Février 2008, 5h48mn 03s Objet : Re: Re : Re : Re : Re : [singularity] Quantum resonance btw DNA strands? Hi Bruno, effectively,my commentary is very short so excuse-my(i drive my pc with my eyes because i am a a.l.s with tracheo and gastro and i was a speaker,not a writer and it's difficult) Well that is certainly a good reason for your commentaries being short! hello ben ok ,i stop,no problem i am thinking mcfadden'theory was possible right because of wave-matter-structure and no-particle-matter-structure Certainly the wave nature of matter is a necessary prerequisite for McFadden's theory to be correct -- but that's already built into quantum mechanics, right? The question is whether proteins really function as macroscopic quantum systems, in the way that McFadden suggests. They may or may not, but I don't think the answer is obvious from the wave nature of matter... -- Ben - This list is sponsored by AGIRI: http://www.agiri.org/email To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: http://v2.listbox.com/member/?; _ Ne gardez plus qu'une seule adresse mail ! Copiez vos mails vers Yahoo! Mail http://mail.yahoo.fr --- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: Infinitely Unlikely Coincidences [WAS Re: [singularity] AI critique by Jaron Lanier]
Stathis Papaioannou wrote: On 17/02/2008, Richard Loosemore [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The first problem arises from Lanier's trick of claiming that there is a computer, in the universe of all possible computers, that has a machine architecture and a machine state that is isomorphic to BOTH the neural state of a brain at a given moment, and also isomorphic to the state of a particular rainstorm at a particular moment. In the universe of all possible computers and programs, yes. This is starting to be rather silly because the rainstorm and computer then diverge in their behavior in the next tick of the clock. Lanier then tries to persuade us, with some casually well chosen words, that he can find a computer that will match up with the rainstorm AND the brain for a few seconds, or a few minutes ... or ... how long? Well, if he posits a large enough computer, maybe the whole lifetime of that brain? The problem with this is that what his argument really tells us is that he can imagine a quasi-infinitely large, hypothetical computer that just happens to be structured to look like (a) the functional equivalent of a particular human brain for an indefinitely long period of time (at least the normal lifetime of that human brain), and, coincidentally, a particular rainstorm, for just a few seconds or minutes of the life of that rainstorm. The key word is coincidentally. There is no reason why it has to be *the same* computer from moment to moment. If your mind were uploaded to a computer and your physical brain died, you would experience continuity of consciousness (or if you prefer, the illusion of continuity of consciousness, which is just as good) despite the fact that there is a gross physical discontinuity between your brain and the computer. You would experience continuity of consciousness even if every moment were implemented on a completely different machine, in a completely different part of the universe, running in a completely jumbled up order. Some of this I agree with, though it does not touch on the point that I was making, which was that Lanier's argument was valueless. The last statement you make, though, is not quite correct: with a jumbled up sequence of episodes during which the various machines were running the brain code, he whole would lose its coherence, because input from the world would now be randomised. If the computer was being fed input from a virtual reality simulation, that would be fine. It would sense a sudden change from real world to virtual world. But again, none of this touches upon Lanier's attempt to draw a bogus conclusion from his thought experiment. No external observer would ever be able to keep track of such a fragmented computation and as far as the rest of the universe is concerned there may as well be no computation. This makes little sense, surely. You mean that we would not be able to interact with it? Of course not: the poor thing will have been isolated from meanigful contact with the world because of the jumbled up implementation that you posit. Again, though, I see no relevant conclusion emerging from this. I cannot make any sense of your statement that as far as the rest of the universe is concerned there may as well be no computation. So we cannot communicate with it anymore that should not be surprising, given your assumptions. But if the computation involves conscious observers in a virtual reality, why should they be any less conscious due to being unable to observe and interact with the substrate of their implementation? No reason at all! They would be conscious. Isaac Newton could not observe and interact with the substrate of his implementation, without making a hole in his skull that would have killed his brain ... but that did not have any bearing on his consciousness. In the final extrapolation of this idea it becomes clear that if any computation can be mapped onto any physical system, the physical system is superfluous and the computation resides in the mapping, an abstract mathematical object. This is functionalism, no? I am not sure if you are disagreeing with functionalism or supporting it. ;-) Well, the computation is not the implemenatation, for sure, but is it appropriate to call it an abstract mathematical mapping? This leads to the idea that all computations are actually implemented in a Platonic reality, and the universe we observe emerges from that Platonic reality, as per eg. Max Tegmark and in the article linked to by Matt Mahoney: I don't see how this big jump follows. I have a different interpretation that does not need Platonic realities, so it looks like a non-sequiteur to me. http://www.mattmahoney.net/singularity.html I ind most of what Matt says in this article to be incoherent. Assertions pulled out of thin air and citing of unjustifiable claims made by others as if they were god-sent truth. Richard Loosemore
Re: Infinitely Unlikely Coincidences [WAS Re: [singularity] AI critique by Jaron Lanier]
--- Richard Loosemore [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: When people like Lanier allow themselves the luxury of positing infinitely large computers (who else do we know who does this? Ah, yes, the AIXI folks), they can make infinitely unlikely coincidences happen. It is a commonly accepted practice to use Turing machines in proofs, even though we can't actually build one. Hutter is not proposing a universal solution to AI. He is proving that it is not computable. Lanier is not suggesting implementing consciousness as a rainstorm. He is refuting its existence. -- Matt Mahoney, [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [singularity] AI critique by Jaron Lanier
--- John Ku [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 2/16/08, Matt Mahoney [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I would prefer to leave behind these counterfactuals altogether and try to use information theory and control theory to achieve a precise understanding of what it is for something to be the standard(s) in terms of which we are able to deliberate. Since our normative concepts (e.g. should, reason, ought, etc) are fundamentally about guiding our attitudes through deliberation, I think they can then be analyzed in terms of what those deliberative standards prescribe. I agree. I prefer the approach of predicting what we *will* do as opposed to what we *ought* to do. It makes no sense to talk about a right or wrong approach when our concepts of right and wrong are programmable. I don't quite follow. I was arguing for a particular way of analyzing our talk of right and wrong, not abandoning such talk. Although our concepts are programmable, what matters is what follows from our current concepts as they are. There are two main ways in which my analysis would differ from simply predicting what we will do. First, we might make an error in applying our deliberative standards or tracking what actually follows from them. Second, even once we reach some conclusion about what is prescribed by our deliberative standards, we may not act in accordance with that conclusion out of weakness of will. It is the second part where my approach differs. A decision to act in a certain way implies right or wrong according to our views, not the views of a posthuman intelligence. Rather I prefer to analyze the path that AI will take, given human motivations, but without judgment. For example, CEV favors granting future wishes over present wishes (when it is possible to predict future wishes reliably). But human psychology suggests that we would prefer machines that grant our immediate wishes, implying that we will not implement CEV (even if we knew how). Any suggestion that CEV should or should not be implemented is just a distraction from an analysis of what will actually happen. As a second example, a singularity might result in the extinction of DNA based life and its replacement with a much faster evolutionary process. It makes no sense to judge this outcome as good or bad. The important question is the likelihood of this occurring, and when. In this context, it is more important to analyze the motives of people who would try to accelerate or delay the progression of technology. -- Matt Mahoney, [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: Infinitely Unlikely Coincidences [WAS Re: [singularity] AI critique by Jaron Lanier]
Matt Mahoney wrote: --- Richard Loosemore [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: When people like Lanier allow themselves the luxury of positing infinitely large computers (who else do we know who does this? Ah, yes, the AIXI folks), they can make infinitely unlikely coincidences happen. It is a commonly accepted practice to use Turing machines in proofs, even though we can't actually build one. So? That was not the practice that I condemned. My problem is with people like Hutter or Lanier using thought experiments in which the behavior of quasi-infinite computers is treated as if it were a meaningful thing in the real universe. There is a world of difference between that and using Turing machines in proofs. Hutter is not proposing a universal solution to AI. He is proving that it is not computable. He is doing nothing of the sort. As I stated in the quote above, he is drawing a meaningless conclusion by introducing a quasi-infinite computation into his proof: when people try to make claims about the real world (i.e. claims about what artificial intelligence is) by postulating machines with quasi-infinite amounts of computation going on inside them, they can get anything to happen. Lanier is not suggesting implementing consciousness as a rainstorm. He is refuting its existence. And you missed what I said about Lanier, apparently. He refuted nothing. He showed that with a quasi-infinite computer in his thought experiment, he can make a coincidence happen. Big deal. Richard Loosemore --- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [singularity] AI critique by Jaron Lanier
On 2/17/08, Matt Mahoney [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Nevertheless we can make similar reductions to absurdity with respect to qualia, that which distinguishes you from a philosophical zombie. There is no experiment to distinguish whether you actually experience redness when you see a red object, or simply behave as if you do. Nor is there any aspect of this behavior that could not (at least in theory) be simulated by a machine. You are relying on a partial conceptual analysis of qualia or consciousness by Chalmers that maintains that there could be an exact physical duplicate of you that is not conscious (a philosophical zombie). While he is in general a great philosopher, I suspect his arguments here ultimately rely too much on moving from, I can create a mental image of a physical duplicate and subtract my image of consciousness from it, to therefore, such things are possible. At any rate, a functionalist would not accept that analysis. On a functionalist account, consciousness would reduce to something like certain representational activities which could be understood in information processing terms. A physical duplicate of you would have the same information processing properties, hence the same consciousness properties. Once we understand the relevant properties it would be possible to test whether something is conscious or not by seeing what information it is or is not capable of processing. It is hard to test right now because we have at the moment only very incomplete conceptual analyses. --- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: Infinitely Unlikely Coincidences [WAS Re: [singularity] AI critique by Jaron Lanier]
On 18/02/2008, Richard Loosemore [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The last statement you make, though, is not quite correct: with a jumbled up sequence of episodes during which the various machines were running the brain code, he whole would lose its coherence, because input from the world would now be randomised. If the computer was being fed input from a virtual reality simulation, that would be fine. It would sense a sudden change from real world to virtual world. The argument that is the subject of this thread wouldn't work if the brain simulation had to interact with the world at the level of the substrate it is being simulated on. However, it does work if you consider an inputless virtual environment with conscious inhabitants. Suppose you are now living in such a simulation. From your point of view, today is Monday and yesterday was Sunday. Do you have any evidence to support the belief that Sunday was was actually run yesterday in the real world, or that it was run at all? The simulation could have been started up one second ago, complete with false memories of Sunday. Sunday may not actually be run until next year, and the version of you then will have no idea that the future has already happened. But again, none of this touches upon Lanier's attempt to draw a bogus conclusion from his thought experiment. No external observer would ever be able to keep track of such a fragmented computation and as far as the rest of the universe is concerned there may as well be no computation. This makes little sense, surely. You mean that we would not be able to interact with it? Of course not: the poor thing will have been isolated from meanigful contact with the world because of the jumbled up implementation that you posit. Again, though, I see no relevant conclusion emerging from this. I cannot make any sense of your statement that as far as the rest of the universe is concerned there may as well be no computation. So we cannot communicate with it anymore that should not be surprising, given your assumptions. We can't communicate with it so it is useless as far as what we normally think of as computation goes. A rainstorm contains patterns isomorphic with an abacus adding 127 and 498 to give 625, but to extract this meaning you have to already know the question and the answer, using another computer such as your brain. However, in the case of an inputless simulation with conscious inhabitants this objection is irrelevant, since the meaning is created by observers intrinsic to the computation. Thus if there is any way a physical system could be interpreted as implementing a conscious computation, it is implementing the conscious computation, even if no-one else is around to keep track of it. -- Stathis Papaioannou --- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [singularity] AI critique by Jaron Lanier
--- John Ku [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 2/17/08, Matt Mahoney [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Nevertheless we can make similar reductions to absurdity with respect to qualia, that which distinguishes you from a philosophical zombie. There is no experiment to distinguish whether you actually experience redness when you see a red object, or simply behave as if you do. Nor is there any aspect of this behavior that could not (at least in theory) be simulated by a machine. You are relying on a partial conceptual analysis of qualia or consciousness by Chalmers that maintains that there could be an exact physical duplicate of you that is not conscious (a philosophical zombie). While he is in general a great philosopher, I suspect his arguments here ultimately rely too much on moving from, I can create a mental image of a physical duplicate and subtract my image of consciousness from it, to therefore, such things are possible. My interpretation of Chalmers is the opposite. He seems to say that either machine consciousness is possible or human consciousness is not. At any rate, a functionalist would not accept that analysis. On a functionalist account, consciousness would reduce to something like certain representational activities which could be understood in information processing terms. A physical duplicate of you would have the same information processing properties, hence the same consciousness properties. Once we understand the relevant properties it would be possible to test whether something is conscious or not by seeing what information it is or is not capable of processing. It is hard to test right now because we have at the moment only very incomplete conceptual analyses. It seems to me the problem is defining consciousness, not testing for it. What computational property would you use? For example, one might ascribe consciousness to the presence of episodic memory. (If you don't remember something happening to you, then you must have been unconscious). But in this case, any machine that records a time sequence of events (for example, a chart recorder) could be said to be conscious. Or you might ascribe consciousness to entities that learn, seek pleasure, and avoid pain. But then I could write a simple program like http://www.mattmahoney.net/autobliss.txt with these properties. It seems to me that any other testable property would have the same problem. -- Matt Mahoney, [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- singularity Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/11983/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/11983/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=4007604id_secret=96140713-a54b2b Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
