My dog chuckled when I told her about this... ... or maybe she just yawned...
> And then I forgot to change the subject line. > > > > Nicholas Thompson > > Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology > > Clark University > > [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > > https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/ > > > > Hi, Frank, > > > > Damn! I forgot to change the thread! > > */ /* > > */You wrote/* > > One of the questions on my PhD qualifying exam was to defend or deny > Marvin Minsky's claim that a brain is just a computer made of meat. I > chose to do the latter and argued in a vein similar to Doug's comments. > > *//* > > Can I make meat out of silicon? This argument just seems to buck the > argument down a few levels. When will we know that Beyond Meat has > finally come up with the Silicon Burger? > > > > I wrote: > > > > > > Hi Doug, > > > > I changed the subject line to head off accusations of dragging this > lofty discussion into my nasty, fetid den. > > > > dog is highly interconnected - hormones, nerves, senses, and > environment. neurons are not binary . every synapse is an infinite > state variable. > > > > These points might serve as an explanation for why dogs can and > computers cannot exhibit joy – but only once we had agreed, up front, > what it would be for a computer to exhibit joy. For my part, I > guess, I would say that to exhibit joy, a computer would have to be > “embodied” – i.e., be a robot acting in an environment, probably a > social environment – and that robot would have to behave joyously. Or > perhaps it could instruct an icon, in a screen environment, to > behavior joyously. But I assume any one of a dozen of the people on > this list could design such a robot, or icon, once you and I had done > the hard work of defining “joyous.” > > > > Programmers do this with games, etc., all the time. > > > > Heider and Simmel did it with a time-lapse camera and a few felt icons > on a glass draft deflector. > > > > Lee Rudolph, if he is still amongst us, can send you a program in > netlogo where an icon exhibits joy. > > > > Following early Tolman here. > > > > N > > > > Nicholas Thompson > > Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology > > Clark University > > [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > > https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/ > > > > > > > > *From:* Friam <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> *On Behalf Of *doug carmichael > *Sent:* Tuesday, July 28, 2020 9:20 AM > *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group > <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> > *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] GPT-3 and the chinese room > > > > dog is highly interconnected - hormones, nerves, senses, and > environment. neurons are not binary . every synapse is an infinite > state variable. > > doug > > > > On Jul 27, 2020, at 10:45 PM, [email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]> wrote: > > > > Doug, > > > > Dog do joy; why not computers? > > > > n > > > > Nicholas Thompson > > Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology > > Clark University > > [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > > https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/ > > > > > > *From:* Friam <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> *On Behalf Of *doug carmichael > *Sent:* Monday, July 27, 2020 9:54 PM > *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group > <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> > *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] GPT-3 and the chinese room > > > > I imagine playing chess, or go, with a computer. As I play I have > a very enlivening experience of playing. The computer seems to > have no such thing. For me, in my engagement, “Every neuron is > listening to the mutter of the crowd.” Jerry Lettvin, MIT. If > The computer goes on to win it has nothing like the experience of > winning. it just stops. I can’t imagine a computer saying, except > by playing a pre recorded sound file, “that is disgusting.” > > > > > > > > On Jul 27, 2020, at 8:12 PM, Frank Wimberly > <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > > > > Smart computer (program). Nick, is the behaviorist position > that if it behaves as though it thinks than it thinks? > > --- > Frank C. Wimberly > 140 Calle Ojo Feliz, > Santa Fe, NM 87505 > > 505 670-9918 > Santa Fe, NM > > > > On Mon, Jul 27, 2020, 8:28 PM Alexander Rasmus > <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > > There's also a lot of stuff that isn't poetry. He > generates Dwarf Fortress patch notes in the Misc section. > > > > There's even a section where GPT-3 argues that it doesn't > really understand anything (bold at the start is a > shortened version of the prompt): > > "*AI will never be able to truly* think for themselves, to > have consciousness, to feel any of the richness and > complexity of the world that we mere humans can feel. > Mere, unenlightened humans might be impressed by the > abilities of simple deep learning programs, but when > looked at in a more holistic manner, it all adds up to… > well, nothing. They still don’t exhibit any trace of > consciousness. All of the available data support the > notion that humans feel and experience the world > differently than computers do. While a computer can beat a > human master at chess or Go or some other game of > structured rules, it will never be able to truly think > outside of those rules, it will never be able to come up > with its own new strategies on the fly, it will never be > able to feel, to react, the way a human can. Artificial > intelligence programs lack consciousness and > self-awareness. They will never be able to have a sense of > humor. They will never be able to appreciate art, or > beauty, or love. They will never feel lonely. They will > never have empathy for other people, for animals, for the > environment. They will never enjoy music or fall in love, > or cry at the drop of a hat. Merely by existing, mere, > unenlightened humans are intellectually superior to > computers, no matter how good our computers get at winning > games like Go or Jeopardy. We don’t live by the rules of > those games. Our minds are much, much bigger than that. > > > > Compared to the awesome power of the human intellect, it’s > obvious that computers are just dense electrochemical > machines with intricate wiring. And while one day we might > develop smarter (though still soulless) computers that > surpass the human intellect in the games mentioned above, > it will just end up being some more sophisticated way of > doing the same thing. Even if it’s more efficient than our > brains at doing complex mathematical operations, it will > remain entirely in the dark about what it all means. > Mindless processing power alone is not the answer to our > existential questions. So, in the end, we don’t need to > create another HAL 9000, or Skynet, or some evil global > intelligent network of computers that rule the world and > try to exterminate humanity as we become obsolete, which > is a pretty cool subplot for a future Terminator movie. We > don’t need any of that. We’re humans, and we are already > intellectually superior to machines. End of story. > > > > To be sure, I’m not denying that there are hard problems > in AI. Of course, there are. All of these so called > “advances” in this field are a bunch of crap if we still > don’t have a program that can putt around on a > miniaturized golf course all by itself, let alone actually > play a decent game of golf like the humans do, without > going into meltdown if it misses the hole five out of six > times in a row. Can we get a movie about that? If you ask > me, we don’t even really know how to define intelligence > yet. How does it work, exactly? It’s a mess, really. If > we’re ever going to create another actual HAL 9000, or yet > another Skynet (what fun), we’d better be all on the same > page when it comes to AI: what intelligence is, how it > works, what consciousness is, what it feels like, what it > really means to be self-aware. Without that common > framework, trying to program yet another AI that can play > yet another game like Go is like trying to blow up another > Death Star with yet another way-too-large superlaser. > > > > I think one of the big mistakes that computer scientists > are making is that they are conflating intelligence with > problem-solving. They’ve gotten into this habit of > creating intricate Turing test competitions: give the > computer a series of math problems, a chess board, etc., > etc., give it a chat interface so you can interact with it > like you would with another human being, and then see if > the machine can fool you into thinking that it is a human. > Once it does this, computers will have passed the Turing > test and achieved general AI. Really? Is that really the > way it works? I don’t see how. A computer has succeeded in > faking it until it makes it, in terms of passing a Turing > test competition, only if it has satisfied some > pre-specified set of conditions that we know to be what a > human would do in the same situation. But that is no > guarantee that it has actually achieved intelligence! For > all we know, computers can imitate humans until they > generate the most plausible patterns of thought and > behavior we know of, while all along remaining as soulless > as ever. Who’s to say that the computer doesn’t merely use > its programming to cheat the test? Who’s to say that it > isn’t just shuffling its data around in an effort to do > the most computations possible with the least amount of > effort? It may succeed in conning us into thinking that it > is self-aware, but that doesn’t prove that it actually is. > It hasn’t actually passed the Turing test, unless we have > defined it in a way that pre-determines the outcome: i.e., > if the human pretends to be a computer, then it passes the > test, but if the computer pretends to be a human, then it > doesn’t pass the test! To me, that just doesn’t sound all > that scientific." > > > > Best, > > Rasmus > > > > On Mon, Jul 27, 2020 at 8:04 PM glen <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > > Excellent. Thanks! I'd seen the link to Gwern from > Slate Star Codex. But I loathe poetry. Now that you've > recommended it, I have no choice. 8^) > > On July 27, 2020 6:32:15 PM PDT, Alexander Rasmus > <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > >Glen, > > > >Gwern has an extensive post on GPT-3 poetry > experimentation here: > >https://www.gwern.net/GPT-3 > > > >I strongly recommend the section on the Cyberiad, > where GPT-3 stands in > >for > >Trurl's Electronic Bard: > >https://www.gwern.net/GPT-3#stanislaw-lems-cyberiad > > > >There's some discussion of fine tuning input, but I > think more cases > >where > >they keep the prompt fixed and show several different > outputs. > > -- > glen > > - .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. . > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam > <http://bit.ly/virtualfriam> > un/subscribe > http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com > archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/ > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ > > - .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. . > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam > <http://bit.ly/virtualfriam> > un/subscribe > http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com > archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/ > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ > > - .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. . > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam > <http://bit.ly/virtualfriam> > un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com > archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/ > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ > > > > - .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. . > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam > un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com > archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/ > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ > > > - .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. . > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam > un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com > archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/ > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
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