I agree that there are many better questions to elucidate the tricks/pitfalls of language. but lets list the biggest time wasters first, and the post showed some real time wasters from various fields that i found valuable to be aware of
> It implies it is pointless to ask what the essence of time is, but then > proceeds to give an explanation of time that is not pointless, and may shed > light on its meaning, which is perhaps as much of an essence as time has.. > i think the post tries to show that the error is that treating time like an object of reality with an essence is nonsensical and a waste of time;) it seems wonderful to have an AGI system answer such a question with "time is a human label of arbitrary length based on conventions among human subgroups" what more needs to be said of time than that it is a label, allowing the word essence creates a very hard and confusing and pointless internal 'debate' in an AGI, essence means a further compression of data or synopsis of concept or a deeper fundamental level of truth not its meaning... so i would be happier hearing time has no essence, time is defined as: > > > Similarly, it implies it is pointless to ask what is the nature of > consciousness, and then gives an explanation, that while not necessarily > correct, or even close to complete, has some meaning about the nature of > what we call consciousness. > > > same as above... having researchers looking around for something that doesnt exist is a time waster. having word handles to easily move abstract concepts about is a productivity enhancer IF and ONLY if communicants share word definitions. since consciousness the word needs to be defined as how many simple behaviors are we going to require before we agree to call something conscious, this defining stage is critical before any use of the word, so if an AGI is asked the question 'what is consciousness' if would have to respond that its defined differently by all askers, so it has no nature, its just a variable that needs to be defined before its use in a conversation.... i guess the key here is that there is an important division between legitimate language and nonsense, and i never see us try to protect our systems from being burdened by the nonsense ------------------------------------------- agi Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=120640061-aded06 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
