Mike In case you're curious I wrote down my theory of emotions here
http://www.goertzel.org/dynapsyc/2004/Emotions.htm (an early version of text that later became a chapter in The Hidden Pattern) Among the conclusions my theory of emotions leads to are, as stated there: ***** * AI systems clearly will have emotions * Their emotions will include, at least, happiness and sadness and spiritual joy * Generally AI systems will probably experience less intense emotions than humans, because they can have more robust virtual multiverse modeling components, which are not so easily bollixed up – so they'll less often have the experience of major non-free-will-related mental-state shifts * Experiencing less intense emotions does not imply experiencing less intense states of consciousness. Emotion is only one particular species of state-of-consciousness. * The specific emotions AI systems will experience will probably be quite different from those of humans, and will quite possibly vary widely among different AI systems * If you put an AI in a human-like body with the same sorts of needs as primordial humans, it would probably develop every similar emotions to the human ones ***** -- Ben On Dec 12, 2007 9:27 PM, Mike Tintner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I don't think you've answered my point - which perhaps wasn't put well > enough. > > All you propose, as far as I can see, is to apply *values* to behaviour - to > apply positive and negative figures to behaviours considered beneficial or > detrimental, and thus affect the system's further behaviour - reinforcing > it, for example. > > It is more or less like a value approach to investing on stocks on the > stockmarket - when their value goes up or down, a formula determines whether > the system buys more or less shares. > > But this is a purely numerical approach to altering behaviour. There is > nothing a priori wrong with it - although, in fact, (although this is a more > complex argument which I won't really go into), it would never actually work > for AGI, which has to deal with problems where it is impossible to apply > precise or reliable values. > > But the important point here is that these *values* are not *emotions* at > all. They're fundamentally different entities and affect behaviour in > fundamentally different ways - your values, for example, will not cause any > pleasure or pain to a self, or have a corporeal, hormonal nature, or > conflict. You, like others, are trying to invest your value system with a > complexity and dignity that it simply hasn't got and has no right to. It's > absurd - you might just as well talk of every plus or minus sign in a > mathematical calculation as conferring pleasure or pain. > > It also shows a very limited understanding of emotions. > > > > Matt: Mike Tintner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > Matt: I don't believe that the ability to feel pleasure and pain depends > > on > > > consciousness. That is just a circular definition. > > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie > > > > Richard:It is not circular. Consciousness and pleasure/pain are both > > subjective > > issues. They can resolved together. > > > > Both of you, in fairly standard fashion, are approaching humans and > > animals > > as if they were dissected on a table with consciousness/ emotions/ > > pleasure > > & pain lying around. > > > > The reality is that we are integrated systems in which - > > > > a self > > > > is continually subjected to > > > > and feels (or to some extent may choose not to feel) > > > > emotions (involving pleasure/pain) > > > > via a (two-way) nervous system. > > > > The questions Matt has to answer is: > > > > 1) are the systems you envisage going to have a self (to feel emotions) - > > and if so, why? > > No, I am proposing a measure of reinforcement for intelligence in general, > whether human, animal, or machine, all of which fall under Legg and Hutter's > universal intelligence ( http://www.vetta.org/documents/ui_benelearn.pdf ), > which is based on Hutter's AIXI model ( > http://www.hutter1.net/ai/aixigentle.htm ). In this model, an agent and an > environment are modeled by a pair of interactive Turing machines exchanging > symbols. In addition, the environment sends a utility or reinforcement > signal > to the agent at each step. The goal of the agent is to maximize the > accumulated utility. The paper on universal intelligence (UI) proposes > defining intelligence as the expected accumulated utility for a randomly > chosen environment (from a Solomonoff distribution of environments, i.e. > self > delimiting Turing machines chosen by coin flips). Hutter's AIXI model shows > that the most intelligent strategy is to guess at each step that the > environment is simulated by the shortest program consistent with the > observed > interaction so far. However, AIXI is not computable. > > In humans, it is natural to think of positive utility or reinforcement as a > "reward" signal or pleasure, and negative utility as a penalty, such as > pain. > In this respect, humans seek to maximize expected accumulated utility. But > this is not quite right because utility has no scale in the AIXI/UI model. > If > you double a reward (e.g. food or money) or punishment (e.g. electric shock) > to a human or animal, you approximately double the change in behavior. But > in > the AIXI/UI model, if you double the utility signal, the agent's strategy > does > not change. > > I propose a measure of a bound on reinforcement which is more consistent > with > our intuitive notion of pain and pleasure. The strength of a signal is > bounded by the change in the state of the agent, the amount of information > learned, as measured by Kolmogorov complexity. This bound is consistent > with > intuition. For example, a person under anesthesia feels no pain during > surgery and also has no memory (learning) during this time. Drugs that > increase the rate of learning (synaptic changes), such as hallucinogens, > also > heighten sensations of both pain and pleasure. Children learn faster than > adults, and also react more strongly to pain and pleasure. > > Allow me to distinguish between utility and reinforcement as follows. An > agent's goal is to maximize utility, but utility is independent of the > agent's > behavior, and has no scale. Reinforcement depends on the agent, such that > if > an agent's state changes from S1 to S2 as the result of reinforcement R, > then > |R| <= K(S2|S1), the number of bits needed to describe the state change. > > If you accept this definition then you could say that a human has 1000 times > more capacity to experience pleasure or pain than a mouse because a human > brain is 1000 times larger and therefore can learn 1000 times more. > Likewise, > if humans can learn 10^9 bits and autobliss ( > http://www.mattmahoney.net/autobliss.txt ) can learn 10^2 bits, then > autobliss > experiences 10^-7 as much pain or pleasure as a human. > > You can interpret this how you wish. I make no claims about the morality of > inflicting pain on animals or programs. Morality is an evolved cultural > belief. We believe in compassion to other humans because tribes that > practiced this belief (toward their own members) were more successful than > those that didn't. Likewise, we eat animals. > > > -- Matt Mahoney, [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > ----- > 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/?&; > > > > -- > No virus found in this incoming message. > Checked by AVG Free Edition. > Version: 7.5.503 / Virus Database: 269.17.1/1181 - Release Date: 12/11/2007 > 5:05 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/?&; > ----- 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/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=75490094-e662a4
