As a lawyer, I can tell you there is no clear agreed upon definition for most words, but that doesn't stop most of us from using un-clearly defined words productively many times every day for communication with others. If you can only think in terms of what is exactly defined you will be denied life's most important thoughts.
Although there may be no agreed upon definition of "intelligence" as applied to machines, whatever you think intelligence means for humans, there is reason to believe than within a decade or two machines will have more of it, faster, and capable of more deep and more complex understandings. With regard to your calculator example, I have been telling people for years than in many narrow ways machines are already more intelligent than us. But think of all the ways most of us consider ourselves to be more intelligent than machines. There is good reason to believe that in almost all of those ways in a decade or two machines will be much more intelligent than us. So an exact definition of intelligence is not needed -- by almost any definition of the word that corresponds to its more common sense understanding as applied to people, machines could be built to have more of it than we do within a decade or two. Ed Porter -----Original Message----- From: Matt Mahoney [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, December 21, 2007 5:34 PM To: agi@v2.listbox.com Subject: Re: Possibility of superhuman intelligence (was Re: [agi] AGI and Deity) --- Vladimir Nesov <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Intelligence is 'what brains do' --- Mike Tintner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Don't you read any superhero/superpower comics or sci-fi? Obviously there > are an infinite number of very recognisable forms which a superhuman > intelligence could take. --- [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > How about how many useful patents the AGI can lay claim to in a year. --- Ed Porter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > By "super-human intelligence" I mean an AGI able to learn and perform a > large diverse set of complex tasks in complex environments faster and better > than humans, such as ... So if we can't agree on what intelligence is (in a non human context), then how can we argue if it is possible? My calculator can add numbers faster than I can. Is it intelligent? Is Google intelligent? The Internet? Evolution? -- Matt Mahoney, [EMAIL PROTECTED] ----- 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/?&; ----- 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/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=78752932-c5291a
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