On Mon, Jun 23, 2008 at 8:48 PM, Vladimir Nesov <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > There are only evolution-built animals, which is a very limited > repertoir of intelligences. You are saying that if no apple tastes > like a banana, therefore no fruit tastes like a banana, even banana.
I'm saying if no fruit anyone has ever tasted confers magical powers, and theory says fruit can't do so, and there's no evidence whatsoever that it can, then we should accept that eating fruit does not confer magical powers. > Whether a design is possible or not, you expect to see the same > result, if it was never attempted. And so, the absence of an > implementation of design that was never attempted is not evidence of > impossibility of design. But it has been attempted. I cited not only biological evolution and learning within the lifetime of individuals, but all fields of science and engineering - including AI, where quite a few very smart people (myself among them) have tried hard to design something that could enhance its intelligence divorced from the real world, and all such attempts have failed. Obviously I can't _prove_ the impossibility of this - in the same way that I can't prove the impossibility of summoning demons by chanting the right phrases in Latin; you can always say, well maybe there's some incantation nobody has yet tried. But here's a question for you: Is the possibility of intelligence enhancement in a vacuum a matter of absolute faith, or is there some point at which you would accept it's impossible after all? If the latter, when will you accept its futility? Ten years from now? Twenty? Thirty? ------------------------------------------- agi Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=106510220-47b225 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
