Mike, CopyCat and Shruiti are small systems, and thus limited. (Although as of several years ago there has been an implimentation of Shruiti on a connection machine with, I think, over 100K relation nodes).
But when I read papers I try to focus on their aspects that teach me something valuable, rather than on their limitations. CopyCat helped clarify my thinking on how AI can best find analogies, particularly with its notion of coordianted context-specific slippage, and I found its codelet based control scheme very interesting and very parallelizable. Shruity helped clarify the concept of pasing bindings through implications for me. I also liked the way it indicated how binding might operate through synchrony in the human mind, and I found its concept of reflexive thinking interesting. Both have been valuable in showing me the path forward. >From what I know of Goertzel's work I am very impressed. I think drawing analogies should be child's play for Novamente. Edward W. Porter Porter & Associates 24 String Bridge S12 Exeter, NH 03833 (617) 494-1722 Fax (617) 494-1822 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -----Original Message----- From: Mike Tintner [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, October 12, 2007 8:32 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [agi] Do the inference rules.. P.S. Edward, Thanks again for a detailed response (I really do appreciate it). Your interesting examples of systems confirm my casual impressions of what can actually be done - and my reluctance to shell out money on "Fluid Concepts." Inferences like MARY DOES OWN A BOOK and those from "IF I CHANGED ABC TO ABD, HOW WOULD YOU (THE COPYCAT) MAKE AN ANALOGOUS CHANGE TO MRRJJJ. strike me as fairly trivial, though by no means useless, and not really AGI . (Yes those are what I mean by "purely symbolic" systems, although I take your point that there are no absolute boundaries between different kinds of signs and particularly sign systems - even networks of symbols are used in complex ways that are not just symbolic). Inferences like those you mention in: IF YOU ASKED SUCH A SYSTEM WHAT LOVE BETWEEN A MAN AND A WOMAN WAS, IT WOULD BE ABLE TO GIVE YOU ALL SORTS OF MEANINGFUL GENERALIZATIONS ABOUT WHAT LOVE WAS, BASED ON ALL THE DESCRIPTIONS OF LOVE AND HOW IT MAKES CHARACTERS ACT IN THE BOOKS IT HAS READ. might be v. productive and into AGI territory, but I note that you are talking hypothetically, not about real systems. Ben, if you followed our exchange, has claimed a v. definite form of true AGI analogy - his system inferring from being able to "fetch", how to play hide-and-seek. I would like more explanation and evidence, though. But that's the sort of inference/analogy I think we should all be talking about. Vis-a-vis neuroscience & what it tells us about what information is laid down in the brain, & in what form, I would be vastly more cautious than you. For instance, we see images as properly shaped, right? But the images on the retina have a severely distorted form - see Hawkin's photo in On Intelligence. So where in the brain or in the world is the properly shaped image? (The main point of that question is simply: hey, there's still masses we don't know - although if you have an answer, I'd be v. interested). P.S. I hope you receive my privately emailed post with the definitions you requested. ----- Original Message ----- From: Edward W. <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Porter To: [email protected] Sent: Friday, October 12, 2007 5:49 PM Subject: Re: [agi] Do the inference rules.. P.S. IN RESPONSE TO MIKE TINTNERS Thu 10/11/2007 11:47 PM POST. AGAIN MY RESPONSE IS IN BLUE ALL CAPS. ================================================= Edward, Thanks for interesting info - but if I may press you once more. You talk of different systems, but you don't give one specific example of the kind of useful (& significant for AGI) inferences any of them can produce -as I do with my cat example. I'd especially like to hear of one or more from Novamente, or Copycat. TO THE BEST OF MY KNOWLEDGE THERE IS NO AGI THAT CURRENTLY DOES ANYTHING CLOSE TO HUMAN LEVEL INFERENCING, IF THAT IS WHAT YOU MEAN. NOVAMENTE IS THE CLOSEST THING I KNOW OF. BUT, UNFORTUNATELY, AS OF THIS WRITING, I DONT KNOW ENOUGH ABOUT IT TO KNOW EXACTLY HOW POWERFUL ITS CURRENT CAPABILITIES ARE. BAYESIAN NETS ARE CURRENTLY USED TO DO A TON USEFUL INFERENCING OF A GENERAL TYPE THAT COULD BE VALUABLE TO AGI. FOR EXAMPLE, A LOT OF COMPUTER-BASED DIAGNOSTIC SYSTEMS US IT. BAYESIAN NETS HAVE SOME LIMITS, BUT THE LIMITS ARE BEING LOOSENED BY BRIGHT PEOPLE LIKE DAPHNE KOLLER (REALLY BRIGHT!). I ATTENDED A LECTURE SHE GAVE AT MIT ABOUT A YEAR AND A HALF AGO IN WHICH SHE TALKED ABOUT HER GROUPS WORK ON GETTING BAYSIAN NETS TO HANDLE RELATIONAL REASONING, SOMETHING THAT WOULD SUBSTAINTIALLY INCREASE THEIR POWER. SHE HAS ALSO DONE WORK ON INTRODUCING BAYESIAN INFERENCING INTO FORMAL LOGICS. SHRUITI (DESCRIBED IN ADVANCES IN SHRUT -- A NEURALLY MOTIVATED MODEL .., BY LOKENDRA SHASTRI (A REALLY GREAT PIECE OF WORK)) PROVIDES A SYSTEM IN WHICH INFORMATION IS REPRESENTED IN A PREDICATE LOGIC FORM, IN GENERALIZATION HIERARCHIES, AND WITH A FORM OF PROBABILISTIC IMPLICATION. THIS SYSTEM ANSWERS A QUESTION, SUCH AS DOES MARY OWN A BOOK BY APPROPRIATELY REMEMBERING (THROUGH PROBABILISTIC SPREADING ACTIVATION) THAT JOHN GAVE MARY BOOK 17, THAT IF A DONOR GIVES A RECIPIENT SOMETHING, THE RECIPIENT WILL NORMALLY THEN OWN THAT SOMETHING, AND, THUS THAT MARY OWNS BOOK17, AND THAT BOOK 17 IS A BOOK, AND, THUS, FINALLY, THAT MARY DOES OWN A BOOK. SHRUITI HAS LIMITS, BUT IT IS CAPABLE OF PERFORMING INTERESTING INFERENCES. Can you think of a single analogy or metaphor, in addition, that is purely symbolic? LIKE BEN, I DONT KNOW HOW YOU ARE USING YOUR TERMS. FOR EXAMPLE, WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY PURELY SYMBOLIC. (A QUESTION I HAVE ASKED BEFORE.) COPYCAT MADE ANALOGIES BETWEEN STRINGS OF CHARACTERS, WHICH ARE SYMBOLIC. AN EXAMPLE OF THE TYPE OF PROBLEM IT HANDLED IS: IF I CHANGED ABC TO ABD, HOW WOULD YOU (THE COPYCAT) MAKE AN ANALOGOUS CHANGE TO MRRJJJ. THE COMPUTER PROGRAM CAME UP WITH MULTIPLE DIFFERENT ANSWERS. ONE OF THEM WAS MRRJJJ TO MRRJJJJ. THE DESCRIPTION OF THE SYSTEM I KNOW IS IN CHAPTER 5 OF DOUGLAS HOFSTADTERS FLUID CONCEPTS AND CREATIVE ANALOGIES, PUBLISHED IN 1995 BY BASIC BOOKS. THIS SYSTEM IS ARGUABLY PURELY SYMBOLIC, BUT ITS ALGORITHM DOES EMBODY SOME LIMITED FORM SEMANTICS, SUCH THE RELATIONS OF INDIVIDUAL LETTERS TO ALPHABETICAL ORDER, NOTIONS OF INDIVIDUAL SIMPLE INTEGERS AND THEIR ORDERING, THE NOTION OF ORDERING IN GENERAL, THE NOTION OF BEFORE AND AFTER IN AN ORDERING, THE NOTION OF NEXT TO IN AN ORDERING INDEPENDENT OF DIRECTION, ETC. THIS KNOWLEDGE IS REPRESENTING IN A SLIPNET WHICH VARIABLY DEFINES MEASURE OF SIMILARITY BETWEEN ITS CONCEPTS. DOES THAT MATCH YOUR DEFINITION OF PURELY SYMBOLIC? I ASSUME NOVAMENTE WOULD BE QUITE CAPABLE OF MAKING ANALOGIES. I ALSO ASSUME THERE HAS BEEN MUCH MORE WORK ON ANALOGY, BUT OFF THE TOP OF MY HEAD I DONT KNOW OF IT, OTHER THAN NARS AND NOVAMENTE. I don't, and didn't, deny that logical thought is important. But it's only a small part, I'm arguing of most productive, AGI-type reasoning. IT DEPENDS ON WHAT YOU MEAN BY LOGICAL THOUGHT. IF ALL REASONED INFERENCE IS LOGIC, THEN LOGIC WOULD BE QUITE IMPORTANT TO AGI-TYPE REASONING. EVEN REASONED INFERENCES FROM IMAGES COULD BE VIEWED AS LOGICAL THOUGHT. A POWERFUL AGI WOULD PRESUMABLY INVOLVE MASSIVELY PARALLEL LOGICAL INFERENCING (AS INDICATED BY THE TERM PROBABILISTIC LOGIC NETWORKS FOR NOVAMENTES MAJOR INFERENCING MECHANISM) AND WOULD USE IT NOT ONLY FOR THINGS TRADITIONALLY CONSIDERED LOGICAL REASONING, BUT ALSO FOR MUCH MORE SUBTLE THINGS LIKE USING CONTEXT TO CHANGE THE PROBABLE INTERPRETATION OF A SENTENCE, SUBCONSCIOUS THOUGHT, AND INTUITIVE FEELINGS OR INSIGHTS. THUS, LOGICAL INFERENCE IN AN AGI CAN BE USED FOR MUCH MORE THAN WHAT HAS TRADITIONALLY BEEN CONSIDERED LOGIC OR EVEN REASONING, AND WOULD LIKELY BE A VITAL PART OF THE THINKING OF ANY POWERFUL AGI. Nor BTW are am I arguing at all against symbols, (you might care to look at the "Picture Tree" thread I started a few months ago to better understand my thinking here) - the brain (and any true AGI, I believe) uses symbols, outline graphics [or Johnson's image schemata] and images in parallel, interdependently and continuously, to reason about the world. (Note: "continuously." You seem to think that some occasional sensory grounding of an AGI system here and there will do. No, I'm arguing, it has to be, and is, continuous and applied to all information and subjects). I THINK IT IS OBVIOUS THAT CERTAIN TYPES OF LEARNING REQUIRE REASONABLY HIGH TEMPORAL RESOLUTION IN THE REPRESENTATIONS THEY LEARN FROM. A PRIME EXAMPLE WOULD BE , HUMAN MOTOR CONTROL. What I am arguing against, rather than symbols, is what you might call the "bookroom illusion" - which you saw graphically illustrated in John Rose's post - the illusion that you can "learn about the world just from books" - or, to be precise, that you can learn, and think about and build models of the world with symbols/ text alone. It's an understandable illusion given that we often spend hours apparently doing nothing but read text. But it is an illusion. The brain does, and has to, continuously make sense (in images) of everything we read.And if it can't then that text won't make sense - & it's a case of "I can't see what you are talking about." (1) WITH REGARD TO WHETHER AN AGI HAS TO MAKE SENSE USING IMAGES -- I DONT KNOW HOW YOU ARE DEFINING IMAGES? IT IS NOT CLEAR TO ME THAT ALL POWERFUL, CREATIVE, ADAPTIVE, THINKING, INTUITIVE AGIS REQUIRE 2- OR 3-D SPATIAL MODELS REPRESENTING SENSATIONS OBTAINED BY VISION, TOUCH, OR STEREOPHONIC SPATIAL SENSING. AGAIN, FOR EXAMPLE, I REFER TO THE TYPE OF AGI REFERRED TO IN MY Thu 10/11/2007 8:14 AM POST, AN AGI WHOSE WORLD IS LIMITED TO A PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE, PROGRAMS IT HAS CREATED IN THAT LANGUAGE, THE RESULTING OUTPUT IN ITS WORKSPACE FROM THAT PROGRAM, ITS OBSERVATIONS OF THE CHANGES TO THE WORKSPACE MADE BY ITS VARIOUS PROGRAMS, AND HOW WELL THE CHANGES SATISFY ITS GOALS AND VALUES. I SPEND MUCH OF MY THOUGHT ABOUT AGI THINKING ABOUT REPRESENTATION IN WHAT I CALL SEMANTIC HYPERSPACE. THIS IS THE SPACE OF PATTERNS AND RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN PATTERNS, INCLUDING TEMPORAL RELATIONS. IT IS A HYPERSPACE BECAUSE IT CAN CONTAIN MILLIONS OR BILLIONS OF PATTERNS, EACH OF WHICH IS A POTENTIAL DIMENSION, AND EACH OF ITS SUCCESSION OF ACTIVATION STATES HAS A POTENTIAL COMBINATORIAL EXPLOSION OF POSSIBLE STATES, AND THE SPACE DEFINED BY A SEQUENCE OF JUST TWO SUCH STATES IS A COMBINATORIAL EXPLOSION TIMES A COMBINATORIAL EXPLOSION. SO WE ARE NOT TALKING ABOUT ANYTHING EVEN CLOSE TO A 2- OR 3-DIMENSIONAL SPACE, NOR ANYTHING EVEN CLOSE TO 2-D IMAGE. EVEN SHRUITI (CITED ABOVE), WHEN SOLVING THE DOES MARY OWN A BOOK PROBLEM CREATES A TEMPORARY NETWORKED ACTIVATION STATE IN A SIMPLE SEMANTIC SPACE. I AM ATTACHING A PDF OF A MARK-UP I MADE FROM THE ABOVE QUOTED ARTICLE ABOUT SHRUITI. THE MARK-UP BETTER ILLUSTRATES THE ACTIVATION NET IT CREATES IN SOLVING THIS PROBLEM. WOULD THE NETWORKED REPRESENTATIONS AN AGI MAKES IN SUCH A SEMANTIC HYPERSPACE BE IMAGES OF THE TYPE YOU ARE ADVOCATING? IF SO, IMAGES ARE IMPORTANT TO MY VISION OF AGI. BUT SUCH IMAGES CAN BE CREATED AND REPRESENTED IN LOGICAL SYSTEMS, SUCH AS SHRUITI. (2) WITH REGARD TO BOOKWORLD -- IF ALL THE WORLDS BOOKS WERE IN ELECTRONIC FORM AND YOU HAD A MASSIVE AMOUNT OF AGI HARDWARD TO READ THEM ALL I THINK YOU WOULD BE ABLE TO GAIN A TREMENDOUS AMOUNT OF WORLD KNOWLEDGE FROM THEM, AND THAT SUCH WORLD KNOWLEDGE WOULD PROVIDE A SURPRISING AMOUNT OF GROUNDING AND BE QUITE USEFUL. BUT, AS I SAID IN MY 10/11/2007 7:33 PM POSTING, I THINK THERE WOULD PROBABLY BE SOME PRETTY BIG GAPS IN ITS UNDERSTANDING. SUCH A SYSTEM WOULD PROBABLY BE BRILLIANT IN SOME WAYS AND REALLY DUMB IN OTHERS. WHAT YOU SEEM TO FAIL TO UNDERSTAND IS THAT A REALLY POWERFUL BRAIN HAS AN ABILITY TO CREATE A SENSE OF REALITY OUT OF BITS AND BYTES, IF THOSE BITS AND BYTES ARE PROPERLY GROUNDED IN A SET OF COHERENT RELATIONSHIPS. WE ARE NOT CONSCIOUS OF THE WORLD DIRECTLY, INSTEAD WE ARE CONSCIOUS OF MENTAL CONSTRUCTS THAT HAVE BEEN CREATED BY GENERALIZATIONS OUT OF SENSORY DATA. . FOR EXAMPLE, BECAUSE OF FOVIATION AND CONSTANT SACCADES, OUR EYES AND V1 SEE WITH SUCH DISCONTINUOUS FISHEYED VISION THAT IF WE WERE TO FORCED TO WATCH A TV IMAGE OF WHAT WAS PROJECTED V1 NOT ONLY WOULD WE PROBABLY NOT BE ABLE TO RECOGNIZED MOST OF IT, BUT IF IT WERE ON A LARGE SCREEN TV WE MIGHT PUKE. YET BECAUSE OF THE CORRELATIONS BETWEEN ALL OF THE DIFFERENTLY SHAPED PATTERNS CREATED BY GIVEN SHAPE WHEN SEEN IN DIFFERENT PARTS OF THE FOVIATED FIELD OF VIEW, OUR BRAIN HAS LEARNED A RELATIVELY INVARIANT REPRESENTATION OF THAT SHAPE AND THAT INVARIANT SHAPE IS WHAT WE THINK WE SEE EVEN THOUGH THAT IS NOT WHAT IS BEING PROJECT ON V1. SIMILARLY OUR BRAIN STITCHES TOGETHER THE MULTIPLE VIEWS CREATED BY OUR RAPIDLY SACCADING EYES INTO A SENSE OF A VISUALLY CONTINUOUS SPACE (A TRICK MADE DOUBLY HARD BY FOVIATION.) THUS, OUR SENSE OF REALITY INCLUDES ALL SORTS OF MENTAL FABRICATIONS, CREATED AS REASONABLE REPRESENTATIONS OF RELATIONSHIPS CONTAINED IN THE SENSORY DATA WE RECEIVE. WE HAVE A NOTION THAT THE TOP OF A TABLE IS CONTINUOUS AND SOLID, YET FROM CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS WE KNOW IT IS NOT. IN FACT, CURRENT BRAIN SCIENCE INDICATES WE DONT STORE PICTURES IN ANYTHING LIKE THE FORM OF A PHOTOGRAPH OR A LINE DRAWING. INSTEAD WE NORMALLY STORE A NETWORK OF ONE OR MORE NODES FROM A GEN/COMP HIEARARCHY, EACH OF WHICH MAPS TO MULTIPLE POSSIBLE LOWER LEVEL REPRESENTATIONS UNTIL YOU GET DOWN TO THE EQUIVALENT OF THE PIXEL LEVEL. IT IS GENERALLY BELIEVED THERE IS NO ONE NODE THAT STORES A PARTICULAR IMAGE. SO EVEN OUR MEMORIES OF THE PICTURES YOU CONSIDER SO IMPORTANT ARE SYMBOLIC, IN THAT THEY ARE MADE UP OF NODES THAT SYMBOLIZE PATTERNS OF OTHER NODES. SO GETTING BACK TO BOOKWORLD, WHAT I AM TRYING TO SAY IS THAT JUST AS OUR MINDS FABRICATE CONCEPTS OF PHYSICAL REALITY BASED ON CORRELATIONS AND RELATIONS WITHIN A HUGE AMOUNT OF DATA, AN EXTREMELY POWERFUL AGI THAT HAD A REASONABLE DEEP STRUCTURE REPRESENTATION OF ALL CURRENTLY EXISTING BOOKS WOULD SIMILARLY HAVE FABRICATED CONCEPTS OF A BOOK-WORLD REALITY, AND THAT SUCH CONCEPTS WOULD BE WELL GROUNDED IN THE SENSE THAT THEY WOULD BE CONNECTED BY MANY RELATIONSHIPS, ORDERINGS, GENERALIZATIONS, AND BEHAVIORS. I DONT REALLY KNOW EXACTLY HOW MUCH KNOWLEDGE COULD BE EXTRACTED FROM BOOKWORLD. I KNOW THAT LINGUISTS PLAYING WITH ROUGHLY 1G WORD TEXT CORPORA BITCH ABOUT HOW SPARSE THE DATA IS. BUT MY HUNCH IS THAT IF YOU READ SAY 30 MILLION BOOKS AND THE WEB WITH A GOOD AGI YOU WOULD BE ABLE TO LEARN A LOT. IF YOU ASKED THE BOOKWORLD AGI WHAT HAPPENS WHEN A PERSON DROPS SOMETHING, IT WOULD PROBABLY BE ABLE TO GUESS IT OFTEN FALLS TO THE GROUND, AND THAT IF IT IS MAKE OF GLASS IT MIGHT BREAK. IF YOU ASKED SUCH A SYSTEM WHAT LOVE BETWEEN A MAN AND A WOMAN WAS, IT WOULD BE ABLE TO GIVE YOU ALL SORTS OF MEANINGFUL GENERALIZATIONS ABOUT WHAT LOVE WAS, BASED ON ALL THE DESCRIPTIONS OF LOVE AND HOW IT MAKES CHARACTERS ACT IN THE BOOKS IT HAS READ. I WOULD NOT BE SURPRISED IF SUCH A SYSTEM UPON READING A ROMANTIC NOVEL WOULD PROBABLY HAVE ABOUT AS GOOD A CHANCE AS THE AVERAGE HUMAN READER OF PREDICTING WHETHER TO THE TWO LOVERS WILL OR WILL NOT BE TOGETHER AT THE END OF THE NOVEL. IF YOU ASKED IT ABOUT HOW PEOPLE MENTALLY ADJUST TO GROWING OLD, IT WOULD PROBABLY BE ABLE TO GENERATE A MORE THOUGHTFUL ANSWER THAN MOST YOUNG HUMAN BEINGS. IN SHORT, IT IS MY HUNCH THAT A POWERFUL BOOKWORLD AGI COULD BE EXTREMELY VALUABLE. AND AS I SAID IN MY Thu 10/11/2007 7:33 PM POST, THERE IS NO REASON WHY KNOWLEDGE LEARNED FROM BOOKWORLD COULD NOT BE COMBINED KNOWLEDGE LEARNED BY OTHER MEANS, INCLUDING THE IMAGE SEQUENCES YOU ARE SO FOND OF. Edward W. 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