Derek: I too agree that this is a good idea to exchange information.
For myself, I am a Computer Scientist but before I became a CS, I was a PsychoBiologist so I have a good foundation in both worlds. Also, this has led me to be a Reverse Brain Engineer and a Connectionist. I have been working on the AGI problem for some 25+ years in my spare time which unfortunately is scarce. I also use .Net but I developed a (recursive) Web Service that mimics the functions of a Neuron. I use SQL2005 as the means to define the Neurons in my artificial brain. This is at least my latest attempt after many failures of trying to mimic neurons as single processes that call one another through some means of interprocess communications. These past efforts all reached machine limitations very quickly. With my latest venture, I also define an IP address in my target (artificial) neurons so I can add as many web services running on as many machines as I wish. So far it has been quite successful in my feeble attempts and of course like everyone else, I find the obstacles and work on the next phase to overcome them. This approach is immensely complex and does take a lot from someone to put together so I do not recommend it for everyone to try and I believe is the chief reason why so few do. Although I disagree with the majority of approaches presented on this list, I do find it interesting and insightful to at least attempt to understand what people are doing. I personally do not believe that the methodologies presented on this list (for the most part) will ever succeed at a true AGI; however, I do respect and believe that a lot of interesting things could (will) become of these approaches, and overall, will be short term solutions to some interesting problems. I also believe that true AGI will take quite a long time to nurture and cannot be demonstrated in just a few minutes or days; i.e. I think a true AGI will take months or years to train and this is where success or failure will be difficult to realize. I also believe that in 3 years, AGI could be realized with the proper funding (maybe as little as $500K) due to my approach using .Net Web Services. I do not believe we need more horsepower than is presently available to succeed - it would be nice - but not necessary. This is very bold indeed and I'm sure many would find potentially naive but I think with the right team and hard work, it could be realized (as so many have echoed so many times = money and time are our only enemies). That's who I am and my research/thoughts in a nutshell, Timothy Busbice -----Original Message----- From: DEREK ZAHN [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, March 26, 2007 10:07 AM To: agi@v2.listbox.com Subject: [agi] AGI interests David Clark writes: >Everyone on this list is quite different. It would be interesting to see what basic interests and views the members of this list hold. For a few people, published works answer this pretty clearly but that's not true for most list members. I'll start. I'm a dilettante. I am most interested in spending my time wondering how small a chunk of "code" could implement AGI. I believe that the physical and cultural structure of a human being's environment provide the vast majority of the complexity of a human mind, and there may be a rather small amount of complexity (necessary "code") needed to leverage that environment. I'm interested in figuring out exactly what this small core would need to do. I guess something like 10^16 operations working on 10^16 bits of information is roughly what's required for "human equivalence", given operations and bits defined roughly in current computer terms. I think those numbers are just about average for those interested in AGI who have made public guesses. Since there are still so many orders of magnitude between any hardware I can get my hands on and the amount required, I'm content to just think about things for now and don't feel a big need to write lots of code right now. I do think it is crucial for us to build AGI before it can run at human equivalence in real-time, so we can understand it and hopefully avoid scenarios like Yudkowski describes where self-improvement rapidly spirals out of control. If it turns out that a Commodore 64, Pentium4-based pc, or BlueGene are already powerful enough for AGI, we could be in trouble. What about the rest of you, what are your interests? ----- 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/?list_id=303 -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 268.18.18/734 - Release Date: 3/26/2007 2:31 PM -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 268.18.18/734 - Release Date: 3/26/2007 2:31 PM ----- 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/?list_id=303