On Sat, Aug 17, 2013 at 7:51 PM, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]> wrote: > Coincidental post I wrote yesterday: > > It may not be possible to imitate a human mind computationally, because > awareness may be driven by aesthetic qualities rather than mathematical > logic alone. The problem, which I call the Presentation Problem, is what > several outstanding issues in science and philosophy have in common, namely > the Explanatory Gap, the Hard Problem, the Symbol Grounding problem, the > Binding problem, and the symmetries of mind-body dualism. Underlying all of > these is the map-territory distinction; the need to recognize the difference > between presentation and representation. > > Because human minds are unusual phenomena in that they are presentations > which specialize in representation, they have a blind spot when it comes to > examining themselves. The mind is blind to the non-representational. It does > not see that it feels, and does not know how it sees. Since its thinking is > engineered to strip out most direct sensory presentation in favor of > abstract sense-making representations, it fails to grasp the role of > presence and aesthetics in what it does. It tends toward overconfidence in > the theoretical.The mind takes worldly realism for granted on one hand, but > conflates it with its own experiences as a logic processor on the other. > It’s a case of the fallacy of the instrument, where the mind’s hammer of > symbolism sees symbolic nails everywhere it looks. Through this intellectual > filter, the notion of disembodied algorithms which somehow generate > subjective experiences and objective bodies, (even though experiences or > bodies would serve no plausible function for purely mathematical entities) > becomes an almost unavoidably seductive solution. > > So appealing is this quantitative underpinning for the Western mind’s > cosmology, that many people (especially Strong AI enthusiasts) find it easy > to ignore that the character of mathematics and computation reflect > precisely the opposite qualities from those which characterize > consciousness. To act like a machine, robot, or automaton, is not merely an > alternative personal lifestyle, it is the common style of all unpersons and > all that is evacuated of feeling. Mathematics is inherently amoral, unreal, > and intractably self-interested – a windowless universality of > representation. > > A computer has no aesthetic preference. It makes no difference to a program > whether its output is displayed on a monitor with millions of colors, or > buzzing out of speaker, or streaming as electronic pulses over a wire. This > is the primary utility of computation. This is why digital is not locked > into physical constraints of location. Since programs don’t deal with > aesthetics, we can only use the program to format values in such a way that > corresponds with the expectations of our sense organs. That format of > course, is alien and arbitrary to the program. It is semantically ungrounded > data, fictional variables. > > Something like the Mandelbrot set may look profoundly appealing to us when > it is presented optically as plotted as colorful graphics, but the same data > set has no interesting qualities when played as audio tones.
Ok, but this might be because our visual cortex is better equipped to deal with 2D fractals. Not too surprising. > The program > generating the data has no desire to see it realized in one form or another, > no curiosity to see it as pixels or voxels. The program is absolutely > content with a purely quantitative functionality – with algorithms that > correspond to nothing except themselves. > > In order for the generic values of a program to be interpreted > experientially, they must first be re-enacted through controllable physical > functions. It must be perfectly clear that this re-enactment is not a > ‘translation’ or a ‘porting’ of data to a machine, rather it is more like a > theatrical adaptation from a script. The program works because the physical > mechanisms have been carefully selected and manufactured to match the > specifications of the program. The program itself is utterly impotent as far > as manifesting itself in any physical or experiential way. The program is a > menu, not a meal. Physics provides the restaurant and food, subjectivity > provides the patrons, chef, and hunger. It is the physical interactions > which are interpreted by the user of the machine, and it is the user alone > who cares what it looks like, sounds like, tastes like etc. An algorithm can > comment on what is defined as being liked, but it cannot like anything > itself, nor can it understand what anything is like. > > If I’m right, all natural phenomena have a public-facing mechanistic range > and a private-facing animistic range. I am willing to entertain this type of hypothesis. > An algorithm bridges the gap between > public-facing, space-time extended mechanisms, but it has no access to the > private-facing aesthetic experiences which vary from subject to subject. But why not? Why don't algorithms get the private-facing stuff? How do you explain this natural vs. artificial distinction? > By > definition, an algorithm represents a process generically, but how that > process is interpreted is inherently proprietary. I don't understand what you mean here. Can you elaborate? Telmo. > > Thanks, > Craig > > > > On Friday, August 16, 2013 3:21:11 PM UTC-4, cdemorsella wrote: >> >> Telmo ~ I agree, all the Turing test does is indicate that a computer, >> operating independently -- that is without a human operator supplying any >> answers during the course of the test -- can fool a human (on average) that >> they are dialoging with another person and not with a computer. While this >> is an important milestone in AI research -- it is just a stand in for any >> actual potential real intelligence or awareness. >> >> Increasingly computers are not programmed in the sense of being provided >> with a deterministic instruction set - no matter how complex and deep. >> Increasingly computer code is being put through its own Darwinian process >> using techniques such as genetic algorithms, automata etc. Computers are in >> the process of being turned into self learning code generation engines that >> increasingly are able to write their own operational code. >> >> An AI entity would probably be able to easily pass the Turing test - not >> that hard of a challenge after all for an entity with almost immediate >> access to a huge cultural memory it can contain. However it may not care >> that much to try. >> >> Another study -- I think by Stanford researchers, but I don't have the >> link handy though -- has found that the world's top super computers (several >> of which they were able to test) are currently scoring around the same as an >> average human four year old. The scores were very uneven across various >> areas of intelligence that the standardized IQ tests or four year olds tries >> to measure, as would be expected (after all a super computer is not a four >> year old person). >> >> Personally I think that AI will let us know when it has arisen by whatever >> means it chooses to let us know. That it will know itself what it wants to >> do, and that this knowing for itself and acting for itself will be the >> hallmark event that AI has arrived on the scene. >> >> Cheers, >> -Chris D >> . >> >> From: Telmo Menezes <[email protected]> >> To: [email protected] >> Sent: Friday, August 16, 2013 8:04 AM >> Subject: Re: When will a computer pass the Turing Test? >> >> On Fri, Aug 16, 2013 at 3:42 PM, John Clark <[email protected]> wrote: >> > On Wed, Aug 14, 2013 at 7:09 PM, Chris de Morsella <[email protected]> >> >> > wrote: >> > >> >> > When will a computer pass the Turing Test? Are we getting close? Here >> >> > is >> >> > what the CEO of Google says: “Many people in AI believe that we’re >> >> > close to >> >> > [a computer passing the Turing Test] within the next five years,” >> >> > said Eric >> >> > Schmidt, Executive Chairman, Google, speaking at The Aspen Institute >> >> > on July >> >> > 16, 2013. >> > >> > It could be. Five years ago I would have said we were a very long way >> > from >> > any computer passing the Turing Test, but then I saw Watson and its >> > incredible performance on Jeopardy. And once a true AI comes into >> > existence >> > it will turn ALL scholarly predictions about what the future will be >> > like >> > into pure nonsense, except for the prediction that we can't make >> > predictions >> > that are worth a damn after that point. >> >> I don't really find the Turing Test that meaningful, to be honest. My >> main problem with it is that it is a test on our ability to build a >> machine that deceives humans into believing it is another human. This >> will always be a digital Frankenstein because it will not be the >> outcome of the same evolutionary context that we are. So it will have >> to pretend to care about things that it is not reasonable for it to >> care. >> >> I find it a much more worthwhile endeavour to create a machine that >> can understand what we mean like a human does, without the need to >> convince us that it has human emotions and so on. This machine would >> actually be _more_ useful and _more_ interesting by virtue of not >> passing the Turing test. >> >> Telmo. >> >> > John K Clark >> > >> > -- >> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >> > Groups >> > "Everything List" group. >> > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send >> > an >> > email to [email protected]. >> > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >> >> > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. >> > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Everything List" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to [email protected]. >> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >> >> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. >> > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. 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