Hi Russell, Interesting! I have a good friend who is also an AGI enthusiast who followed the same path as you ... a lot of time burned making his own superior, stripped-down, AGI-customized variant of LISP, followed by a decision to just go with LISP ;-)
But I thought I'd mention that for OpenCog we are planning on a cross-language approach. The core system is C++, for scalability and efficiency reasons, but the MindAgent objects that do the actual AI algorithms should be creatable in various languages, including Scheme or LISP. It's true that LISP is better for self-modifying AI systems, but I figure that intelligently modifying the OpenCog core system is an AGI-hard problem ... i.e., once the system is smart enough to do that, it will be smart enough to learn C++ (or actually create its own superior variant of LISP and recode itself in that ... whatever..) We can do self-modification of components of the system by coding these components in LISP or other highly manipulable languages. Also, the procedures that the system learns itself (e.g. by MOSES) are expressed internally in tree rather than string form, but it would be easy to linearize these trees as LISP programs if one wished (though we have typically linearized them in Combo, a slightly different syntax) -- Ben G On Fri, Oct 24, 2008 at 3:03 AM, Russell Wallace <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>wrote: > I understand that some here have already started a project in a given > language, and aren't going to change at this late date; this is > addressed to those for whom it's still an open question. > > The choice of language is said to not matter very much, and there are > projects for which this is true. AGI is not among them, so I wrote up > my thoughts on the matter in case they be of use to anyone. There > turns out to be a website collecting perspectives like mine, so I > posted it there: > http://wiki.alu.org/Russell_Wallace%27s_Road_to_Lisp > > And copy below: > > I'm doing research in AI on the problem of procedural knowledge, which > means dealing with (creating, debugging, reasoning about) program > code. This entails dealing with code in parse tree form (other ways to > specify computation turn out to be object code, so one way or another > you end up coming back to the parse tree whatever the desired end > product). This necessarily entails using Lisp if we define it in the > broadest sense as the high-level language family that exposes the > parse tree; the decision to make, then, is whether to use an existing > dialect or invent one's own. > > So naturally, as hackers are wont to do, I chose the second option. > > And I was happy as a lark for a while, putting a lot of work into > creating my own language, until in late summer 2008, compelled by > repetitive strain injury to take a break, I thought a bit more about > what I was doing. > > Okay, I thought to myself, instead of using an existing language that > has a dozen mature, efficient implementations, thousands of users and > extensive documentation, you're spending time you haven't got to spare > on creating one that will have a single inefficient prototype > implementation, one user and no documentation. And for what? A nicer > syntax and ditching some historical baggage that isn't really doing > any harm in the first place? > > Sharpen your wits, Russell. This is going to be a hard enough job even > if you're smart about it. Making mistakes like this, you haven't a > prayer. > > After that, the decision to use Common Lisp over Scheme was dictated > by the fact that Common Lisp has the more comprehensive language > standard, which makes it easy to port code (at least code that > primarily performs computation rather than I/O) between > implementations. The ability to defer the choice of implementation is > a significant strategic advantage. > > > ------------------------------------------- > 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/?&; > Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com > -- Ben Goertzel, PhD CEO, Novamente LLC and Biomind LLC Director of Research, SIAI [EMAIL PROTECTED] "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects." -- Robert Heinlein ------------------------------------------- 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
