Ben said, somewhere in the blizzard....
I have been thinking a bit about the nature of conversations on this list.
It seems to me there are two types of conversations here:
1)
Discussions of how to design or engineer AGI systems, using current
computers, according to designs that can feasibly be implemented by
moderately-sized groups of people
2)
Discussions about whether the above is even possible -- or whether it is
impossible because of weird physics, or poorly-defined special
characteristics of human creativity, or the so-called "complex systems
problem", or because AGI intrinsically requires billions of people and
quadrillions of dollars, or whateve
Personally I am pretty bored with all the conversations of type 2
It's not that I consider them useless discussions in a grand sense ...
certainly, they are valid topics for intellectual inquiry.
But, to do anything real, you have to make **some** decisions about what
approach to take, and I've decided long ago to take an approach of trying to
engineer an AGI system.
Now, if someone had a solid argument as to why engineering an AGI system is
impossible, that would be important. But that never seems to be the case.
Rather, what we hear are long discussions of peoples' intuitions and
opinions in this regard. People are welcome to their own intuitions and
opinions, but I get really bored scanning through all these intuitions about
why AGI is impossible.
One possibility would be to more narrowly focus this list, specifically on
**how to make AGI work**.
If this re-focusing were done, then philosophical arguments about the
impossibility of engineering AGI in the near term would be judged **off
topic** by definition of the list purpose.
Potentially, there could be another list, something like "agi-philosophy",
devoted to philosophical and weird-physics and other discussions about
whether AGI is possible or not. I am not sure whether I feel like running
that other list ... and even if I ran it, I might not bother to read it very
often. I'm interested in new, substantial ideas related to the in-principle
possibility of AGI, but not interested at all in endless philosophical
arguments over various peoples' intuitions in this regard.
One fear I have is that people who are actually interested in building AGI,
could be scared away from this list because of the large volume of anti-AGI
philosophical discussion. Which, I add, almost never has any new content,
and mainly just repeats well-known anti-AGI arguments (Penrose-like physics
arguments ... "mind is too complex to engineer, it has to be evolved" ...
"no one has built an AGI yet therefore it will never be done" ... etc.)
What are your thoughts on this?
-- Ben
I think it's rather obvious I'm an AGI builder.
Anyone who has a hardware solution (even though mine can be classed as a
kind of analogue 'computer' if you broaden your definition of 'symbol'
and 'rule'/'algorithm'), not based on existing computer architecture, is
excluded from 1) and 2).... It appears that by definition "to build a
NON-computer-based AGI solution is not building an AGI"! Discussing
non-traditional hardware solutions is NOT philosophy in the same way
that discussion empirical neuroscience, biophysics and cognitive
architecture is not philosophy.
Is the entire list sure that they want (1)? I can't tell yet. You be the
judge.
However, if (1) what is required here then fine. I'd be confined to the
(1) list anyway. I wouldn't bother with (2) as I get that in bucketloads
elsewhere anyway. I'd rather keep in touch with as diverse a group as
possible who are actually doing real physical AGI...From a purely
selfish point of view I need lots of COMP solutions to keep coming thick
and fast - they are one of the controls for my future experiments. /So I
am encouraging (1) style solutions/, albeit constructed with eyes
/scientifically wide open/. A myopic (1) ish forum, for me, will
represent intermittent small dialogs between those few in the forum with
a broader, multidisciplinary approach, still interested in the (1)
approach, like me, that pop up from time to time.
On that $0.02 I'll leave you to it...time for coffee!
cheers,
colin
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agi
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