2008/10/18 Ben Goertzel <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > > 1) > There definitely IS such a thing as a "better algorithm for intelligence in > general". For instance, compare AIXI with an algorithm called AIXI_frog, > that works exactly like AIXI, but inbetween each two of AIXI's computational > operations, it internally produces and then deletes the word "frog" one > billion times. Clearly AIXI is better than AIXI_frog, according to many > reasonable quantitative intelligence measures.
Hi Ben, First off, the quantitative measure of intelligence of both systems would be the same! They both can't exist :-p Brief definition: A system is intelligent in world X if it achieves it's goals. Over most worlds, maybe AIXI is more intelligent. Over all worlds I'd say definately no. The theory behind AIXI doesn't account for death, there is nothing that the system can do to the environment that makes the system stop computing. One world that could easily exist is one where very fast computers where cracked down on, and eliminated with extreme prejudice. A system that slowed down it's aparrent ability to process might not incur the wrath of the anti seedAI police. If you reject that scenario I can construct a real world one, with me a debugger and the dreaded kill command, where I can make the froggy AI more able to do whatever it is trying to do, because it still exists. Arbitrary sure, but humans are strange and arbitrary. So it might be the right thing for the non_froggy AI to change itself to a froggy AI to better achieve it's goals in the long term. This could be considered an improvement, but won't help it improve more quickly in the future. > 2) > More relevantly, there is definitely such a thing as a "better algorithm for > intelligence about, say, configuring matter into various forms rapidly." Or > you can substitute any other broad goal here. Let me put it this way as system designers we are often tasked with choosing between accuracy and speed. Say the problem is generating realistic pictures. Sure we could render everything with radiosity, but you will get far far fewer frames in a given time period than with ray casting even with todays hardware. If you want the best possible picyure you use radiosity and ray tracing, if you want real time motion pictures you would just project the polygons onto a screen with a zbuffer. I see no reason why AIs won't have to make the same decision between speed and accuracy for whatever is "best" for their intelligence in the future. Therefore the better algorithm is context dependent. In terms of reconfiguring matter, if you are sending an expensive probe into the reaches of space you would probably want to model everything down to the last angstrom. Less so if you were just making a towel quickly. These require different ways of thinking. Or would your idea of best would be one that could do both? But then you might be wasting computer resources, if you were never asked to do one or the other of these types of tasks. > 3) > Anyway, I think it's reasonable to doubt my story about how RSI will be > achieved. All I have is a plausibility argument, not a proof. What got my > dander up about Matt's argument was that he was claiming to have a > "debunking" of the RSI ... a proof that it is impossible or infeasible. I > do not think he presented any such thing; I think he presented an opinion in > the guise of a proof.... It may be a reasonable opinion but that's very > different from a proof. He defines RSI too tightly to make much use in the real world. However similar definitions have been done for intelligence. And then things proved about overly tight definition. It worries me that we don't have a way of settling disputes like these. Whether RSI is likely is an important fact for the future of humanity, surely we should be able to pick out some thread of reality that we can experiment on without building full AI. Theories of intelligence should guide us enough to say, "If we exist in a world where RSI is unlikely, X should also be unlikely" and vice versa. As the possibility of faster than light travel was squashed without have to try travelling faster than the speed of light. Will Pearson ------------------------------------------- agi Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=117534816-b15a34 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
