On Sat, 15 Feb 2003, Ben Goertzel wrote:

> > In my book I say that consciousness is part of the way
> > the brain implements reinforcement learning, and I think
> > something like that is necessary for a really robust
> > solution. That's why I think it will take 100 years.
>
> I would say, rather, that consciousness and reinforcement learning are BOTH
> consequences of having the right kind of integrative AGI system...

I look at it from the perspective of evolution of minds.
There is a simple reinforcement learning mechanism in
brains, as described in:

  HOW THE BASAL GANGLIA USE PARALLEL EXCITATORY AND INHIBITORY
  LEARNING PATHWAYS TO SELECTIVELY RESPOND TO UNEXPECTED REWARDING
  CUES. Brown, J., Bullock, D., and Grossberg, S. (1999). Journal
  of Neuroscience.
  on-line at http://cns-web.bu.edu/pub/diana/BroBulGro99.pdf

But this solves the credit assignment problem in only very
limited cases. I think that consciousness (and other things)
evolved in order to do reinforcement learning in more general
situations. That is, the need for robust reinforcement
learning provided the selection pressure for consciousness.

Bill

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