Ben, Mike, et al: Ben: I FINALLY get what you were telling me several years ago, when I was loudly pointing out that AGI research was about as safe as DIY research into cold fusion explosive devices. Your point was that hopefully any rational person would pause before putting such a thing into anything more dangerous than a lawn mower, and certainly NOT hand our nuclear arsenal over to it as was done in the movie *Colossus, The Forbin Project*. If people really ARE stupid enough to do such things, we will all be wiped out anyway, so why restrict AGI research on that basis?!!!
MIke: Anything that can be put into words (and MUCH more) can be expressed mathematically. Presuming that your claims are true, then people are fundamentally unable to express AGI operation. If so, there can be no collaboration, and I think we can all agree that no one person is going to build an AGI from scratch. Hence, you are in effect saying that it is impossible to build an AGI. Right? If so, then just say so (which I think you already have) and let the smart ones heed your warnings not to waste their lives, and move on to something ELSE. I don't believe that anyone here is going to build an AGI, but not because of anything so fundamental as an incapacity of mathematics. I think we can both agree that mathematics would have to be able to describe self-organizing intelligent systems for significant progress to be made. You have the further argument that mathematics is fundamentally unable to EVER so such a thing. You have still advanced NO convincing argument that is not predicated on your own reality belief system, that is VERY different from mine. I think you need to express *exactly* what you think "mathematics" is/are that can't do the job. I suspect that I would agree with you, because my own concept of mathematics is broader than yours. Note that if you can *represent* something in all of its functional detail, you can understand it, simulate it, etc. You seem to think that something is lost in the representing, and it is, ONLY when it is inaccurate or suffers certain practicality flaws, e.g. is beyond any hope of simulation for some reason. Of course if you disagree, please explain exactly how and why to others (like me) to whom this statement is as obvious as the screen you are now reading it from. Steve ==================== On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 10:09 AM, Mike Archbold <[email protected]> wrote: > > > On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 1:50 AM, Mike Tintner <[email protected]>wrote: > >> 4 or IV ? >> >> 4 is a historically belated mathematical solution. >> >> And it - both 4 and IV - is actually false. >> >> In the real world, there are no "4's". To use maths properly, you should >> know that 4 is an ABSTRACTION from the real world - and hold both the >> abstraction and the reality in your mind at the same time. >> >> There is no essential solution to any problem. >> >> But I am in a sense grateful to both you and Steve, because you are >> demonstrating the extraordinary power and grip on the imagination of the >> *myth of rationality* and single "right" or "correct" answers. You >> clearly both passionately WANT there to be one solution - and it is a >> pyschologically natural urge. >> >> > > I does sound like the kinds of arguments taking place here are not really > dependent upon AGI per se and even the current state of technology but fall > along the general lines of the age-old rationalist vs. empiricist debate. > The extreme empiricists/nominalists like arguments such as "just because > we see 500 black crows does not mean the next crow is black" and "just > because everybody who walks out of a ten story building so far as fallen to > their death does not mean it will happen to me." In defense of this > statement you could claim that there exists no such rule we can see -- it > is all imaginary, and so forth. > > It is fun to put yourself in the extreme empiricist camp for a while, but > it certainly seems that eventually to get anywhere you need some > rationality -- which is why Kant came along basically saying that both the > rational and empirical are needed for reasoning. When you say "rationality > is a myth" and there is "no essential solution" -- if I were to believe > that then there would be no structure at all to reality. But plainly there > is structure. > > >> Has it not occurred to you that an agent who can come up with potentially >> infinite answers to a problem is somewhat more useful and intelligent than >> an agent who can come up with only one? >> >> If you can't grok that, (Steve), you really shouldn't be doing AGI. >> >> *From:* Mike Archbold <[email protected]> >> *Sent:* Thursday, July 19, 2012 2:21 AM >> *To:* AGI <[email protected]> >> *Subject:* Re: [agi] Real World/ Creative Reasoning - what no one gets >> about AGI >> >> >> >> On Sun, Jul 15, 2012 at 9:09 AM, Mike Tintner >> <[email protected]>wrote: >> >>> Steve, >>> >>> There are infinite solutions to 2+2 = >>> >>> 4, FOUR, QUATRE, 1111, 6-2, 7-1, .... , llll [lines], 4.2345 real >>> apples .. IV, (and so on in other numeral systems), and so on ad infinitum. >>> >>> (And the above is not playing around or superficial - there are plenty >>> of existing real problems where it is necessary to find an alternative to 4) >>> >>> There are infinite solutions to every problem. >>> >> >> >> This seems like the basic essential / accidental philosophical issue. >> The solution given to the problem "what is 2 + 2?" is always essentially >> going to be 4, but is only accidentally given as "four, quatre, 1111, >> 6-2...." or what have you. >> I believe that Hegel wrote that reality displays "nothing but accidents." >> That doesn't rule out >> *a single essential solution. * >> >> Mike Archbold >> *AGI* | Archives <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now> >> <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/6952829-59a2eca5> | >> Modify <https://www.listbox.com/member/?&;> Your Subscription >> <http://www.listbox.com> >> *AGI* | Archives <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now> >> <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/11943661-d9279dae> | >> Modify <https://www.listbox.com/member/?&;> Your Subscription >> <http://www.listbox.com> >> > > *AGI* | Archives <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now> > <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/10443978-6f4c28ac> | > Modify<https://www.listbox.com/member/?&;>Your Subscription > <http://www.listbox.com> > -- Full employment can be had with the stoke of a pen. Simply institute a six hour workday. That will easily create enough new jobs to bring back full employment. ------------------------------------------- AGI Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/21088071-c97d2393 Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=21088071&id_secret=21088071-2484a968 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
