Mark Waser wrote:
If I understand Richard correctly, he is assuming that it is
necessary to make symbols themselves complex and that each symbol
needs his four forces of doom: Memory, Development, Identity, and
Non-Linearity.
I have no problem with the first three but am not so sure that I
agree with the non-linearity. Certainly, the interactions between
symbols are non-linear but I believe that they are reasonably bounded
-- particularly if you use some intelligent design principles (pun
intended). For example, nature re-uses virtually everything -- I
have to believe that this applies to cognition as well. Similarly,
look at software design patterns (as per Gamma, et. al.). I don't
believe at all that rules governing the behavior of inter-symbol
interactions are necessarily complex. I believe that inter-symbol
interaction will eventually be soluble with a reasonable number of
rules (and rules generated from those rules). Just like gravity, the
behavior generated by the rules WILL be complex but the rules will
not. And just like gravity, there will be more than enough
regularity that we will be able to predict and control the stability
of inter-symbol interaction *as long as* we understand the rules well
enough.
More than once in your recent posts, you have said one particular thing
that does not make any sense to me, so I need to focus on it.
What you said in the above case was "I don't believe ... that rules
governing the behavior of inter-symbol interactions are necessarily
complex".
The problem with this statement is that strictly speaking one can never
say that the RULES governing a system are "complex".
Now, before you jump on me (because I have probably made the same
mistake), I should say that we sometimes talk that way as a kind of
shorthand, but right now we must tread very carefully, so I am going to
be very precise:
The rules that govern a system are just rules - they are not, by
themselves, "complex". The SYSTEM can be complex (meaning: you cannot
understand global behavior from local rules), but the rules themselves
are not complex.
But then what can you say about the rules? What you can say about them
is whether or not they seem likely to generate complexity. Certain
kinds of simple, linear, elegant and separable rules tend not to
generate complexity, but other kinds of ugly, tangled rules do tend to
generate complexity in the system as a whole.
What do I mean by "ugly, tangled rules"? Well, that was the whole point
of me listing the so-called four forces of doom. That list of rule
characteristics:
- Memory
- Development
- Identity
- Nonlinearity
... is just the sort that tends to make the system as a whole complex.
These rules are not "complex" by themselves, it is just that in our
empirical studies of large numbers of experimental systems, putting
THOSE kinds of rules in tends to make the system as a whole behave in a
complex way. Most often it makes the system just random, of course!
But if complexity is going to happen, it is usually because the rules
have one or more of those features.
So, to illustrate why this is a big deal, look at the quote above: you
say that
I have no problem with the first three but am not so sure that I
agree with the non-linearity. Certainly, the interactions between
symbols are non-linear but I believe that they are reasonably bounded...
This is not something you can defend: if you think that the rules that
govern the behavior of symbols do tend to have three of the four
characteristics, then you must expect that the system as a whole will be
complex, because this is just an empirical fact.
In particular, you cannot say "... the interactions between symbols are
non-linear but I believe that they are reasonably bounded...".
Reasonably bounded? That does not buy you anything at all: we can put
the tiniest amount of nonlinearity into a system and leave out all the
others, and the system still can be complex!
Now, it is certainly true that we sometimes utter phrases like "the
rules governing the system are complex", but that is sloppy, because
what we mean is that the rules have enough of these characteristics that
the system is complex. I sometimes do this myself, even though I
shouldn't, but it is generally harmless.
So when you say:
> Just like gravity, the
> behavior generated by the rules WILL be complex but the rules will
> not.
... I have to say that this is a meaningless statement on two counts.
First of all, if the rules have some of those four complexity-generating
characteristics, the system as a whole will almost always be either
complex or random-and-boring. We just do not know of any (many?)
examples of a system that has those four in the elements, but where the
system as a whole is easily predictable or analysable from its element
rules! For anyone to say that they believe that intelligent systems
will be the exception is to fly in the face of all empirical evidence...
it would be the biggest fluke in the history of the universe if a system
had all those, and yet was not either complex or random.
Second, you compare to gravity. Disastrous example: the gravitational
force only has one of the four characteristics, and that is nonlinearity
in n-body systems, where n > 2. And if n > 2, but the system is
dominated by one large mass and a few widely separated little ones, then
the system is mostly not complex (and this, of course, is what applies
in the case of the solar system and Earth satellites). Hoping that the
intelligent systems case will happen to be like the *special* case that
is like the solar system is a big stretch: there is almost no mapping
between the cases.
Reading and re-reading your passage above, I cannot find anything that
says why we should expect the case of interacting symbols to not give
rise to complexity. I hear you when you say you *believe* that there
will not be a problem .... but if you keep in mind everything I have
just said, can you say why you believe that in this case the evidence
for complexity will be overwhelming, but the complexity will simply not
be there?
Richard Loosemore
-------------------------------------------
agi
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