Separating things that are aesthetically pleasing from those that are
not,
only works for one or a group of same ones. So, i believe.
mando
On Apr 4, 2009, at 2:47 PM, [email protected] wrote:
In a message dated 4/4/09 3:25:14 PM, [email protected]
writes:
Here's a remarkable statement:
"A laboratory robot called Adam has been hailed as the first machine
in history to have discovered new scientific knowledge independently
of its human creators."
Story at:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f2b97d9a-1f96-11de-a7a5-00144feabdc0.html
Imagine what this portends for such things as aesthetic judgment,
perceptions and taste.
Not much, say I. Notice the piece was in the Financial Times, not
Nature or
a
philosophical journal.
Consider: Computers have have generated prime numbers far bigger
than any
human ever did. Would we cry with shock and awe, "My God, the
machine is
DISCOVERING things a man never could.
I's a sure thing the Robot in the FT story came up with lots of
data that was
already known -- and the Robot, because it had received incomplete
input,
would never "know" the difference. It just mechanically ground out
mechanical
implications.
The nearest comparison is chess-playing computers. My chess-experts
friends
tell me they have damn near ruined the game. But the computer is
programmed
with a decision-procedure for "recognizing" when a game is over,
won. I do not
believe anyone will write a program that will distinguish future,
unprecedented
arrangements -- of words, paint, musical notes, dance moves --
into those
that are aesthetically pleasing and those that aren't. That last
phrase of
mine
may well draw a rapid orison of fire from listers -- which I think
only
supports my point.
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