Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
Ben, On Mon, Aug 9, 2010 at 1:07 PM, Ben Goertzel b...@goertzel.org wrote: I'm speaking there, on Ai applied to life extension; and participating in a panel discussion on narrow vs. general AI... Having some interest, expertise, and experience in both areas, I find it hard to imagine much interplay at all. The present challenge is wrapped up in a lack of basic information, resulting from insufficient funds to do the needed experiments. Extrapolations have already gone WAY beyond the data, and new methods to push extrapolations even further wouldn't be worth nearly as much as just a little more hard data. Just look at Aubrey's long list of aging mechanisms. We don't now even know which predominate, or which cause others. Further, there are new candidates arising every year, e.g. Burzynski's theory that most aging is secondary to methylation of DNA receptor sites, or my theory that Aubrey's entire list could be explained by people dropping their body temperatures later in life. There are LOTS of other theories, and without experimental results, there is absolutely no way, AI or not, to sort the wheat from the chaff. Note that one of the front runners, the cosmic ray theory, could easily be tested by simply raising some mice in deep tunnels. This is high-school level stuff, yet with NO significant funding for aging research, it remains undone. Note my prior posting explaining my inability even to find a source of used mice for kids to use in high-school anti-aging experiments, all while university labs are now killing their vast numbers of such mice. So long as things remain THIS broken, anything that isn't part of the solution simply becomes a part of the very big problem, AIs included. The best that an AI could seemingly do is to pronounce Fund and facilitate basic aging research and then suspend execution pending an interrupt indicating that the needed experiments have been done. Could you provide some hint as to where you are going with this? Steve --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Nao Nao
Way too pessimistic in my opinion. On Mon, Aug 9, 2010 at 7:06 PM, John G. Rose johnr...@polyplexic.comwrote: Aww, so cute. I wonder if it has a Wi-Fi connection, DHCP's an IP address, and relays sensory information back to the main servers with all the other Nao's all collecting personal data in a massive multi-agent geo-distributed robo-network. So cuddly! And I wonder if it receives and executes commands, commands that come in over the network from whatever interested corporation or government pays the most for access. Such a sweet little friendly Nao. Everyone should get one :) John *From:* Mike Tintner [mailto:tint...@blueyonder.co.uk] An unusually sophisticated ( somewhat expensive) promotional robot vid: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/7934318/Nao-the-robot-that-expresses-and-detects-emotions.html *agi* | Archives https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/| Modifyhttps://www.listbox.com/member/?;Your Subscription http://www.listbox.com *agi* | Archives https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ | Modifyhttps://www.listbox.com/member/?;Your Subscription http://www.listbox.com --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
I'm writing an article on the topic for H+ Magazine, which will appear in the next couple weeks ... I'll post a link to it when it appears I'm not advocating applying AI in the absence of new experiments of course. I've been working closely with Genescient, applying AI tech to analyze the genomics of their long-lived superflies, so part of my message is about the virtuous cycle achievable via synergizing AI data analysis with carefully-designed experimental evolution of model organisms... -- Ben On Tue, Aug 10, 2010 at 7:25 AM, Steve Richfield steve.richfi...@gmail.comwrote: Ben, On Mon, Aug 9, 2010 at 1:07 PM, Ben Goertzel b...@goertzel.org wrote: I'm speaking there, on Ai applied to life extension; and participating in a panel discussion on narrow vs. general AI... Having some interest, expertise, and experience in both areas, I find it hard to imagine much interplay at all. The present challenge is wrapped up in a lack of basic information, resulting from insufficient funds to do the needed experiments. Extrapolations have already gone WAY beyond the data, and new methods to push extrapolations even further wouldn't be worth nearly as much as just a little more hard data. Just look at Aubrey's long list of aging mechanisms. We don't now even know which predominate, or which cause others. Further, there are new candidates arising every year, e.g. Burzynski's theory that most aging is secondary to methylation of DNA receptor sites, or my theory that Aubrey's entire list could be explained by people dropping their body temperatures later in life. There are LOTS of other theories, and without experimental results, there is absolutely no way, AI or not, to sort the wheat from the chaff. Note that one of the front runners, the cosmic ray theory, could easily be tested by simply raising some mice in deep tunnels. This is high-school level stuff, yet with NO significant funding for aging research, it remains undone. Note my prior posting explaining my inability even to find a source of used mice for kids to use in high-school anti-aging experiments, all while university labs are now killing their vast numbers of such mice. So long as things remain THIS broken, anything that isn't part of the solution simply becomes a part of the very big problem, AIs included. The best that an AI could seemingly do is to pronounce Fund and facilitate basic aging research and then suspend execution pending an interrupt indicating that the needed experiments have been done. Could you provide some hint as to where you are going with this? Steve *agi* | Archives https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ | Modifyhttps://www.listbox.com/member/?;Your Subscription http://www.listbox.com -- Ben Goertzel, PhD CEO, Novamente LLC and Biomind LLC CTO, Genescient Corp Vice Chairman, Humanity+ Advisor, Singularity University and Singularity Institute External Research Professor, Xiamen University, China b...@goertzel.org I admit that two times two makes four is an excellent thing, but if we are to give everything its due, two times two makes five is sometimes a very charming thing too. -- Fyodor Dostoevsky --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
Steve, Capable and effective AI systems would be very helpful at every step of the research process. Basic research is a major area I think that AGI will be applied to. In fact, that's exactly where I plan to apply it first. Dave On Tue, Aug 10, 2010 at 7:25 AM, Steve Richfield steve.richfi...@gmail.comwrote: Ben, On Mon, Aug 9, 2010 at 1:07 PM, Ben Goertzel b...@goertzel.org wrote: I'm speaking there, on Ai applied to life extension; and participating in a panel discussion on narrow vs. general AI... Having some interest, expertise, and experience in both areas, I find it hard to imagine much interplay at all. The present challenge is wrapped up in a lack of basic information, resulting from insufficient funds to do the needed experiments. Extrapolations have already gone WAY beyond the data, and new methods to push extrapolations even further wouldn't be worth nearly as much as just a little more hard data. Just look at Aubrey's long list of aging mechanisms. We don't now even know which predominate, or which cause others. Further, there are new candidates arising every year, e.g. Burzynski's theory that most aging is secondary to methylation of DNA receptor sites, or my theory that Aubrey's entire list could be explained by people dropping their body temperatures later in life. There are LOTS of other theories, and without experimental results, there is absolutely no way, AI or not, to sort the wheat from the chaff. Note that one of the front runners, the cosmic ray theory, could easily be tested by simply raising some mice in deep tunnels. This is high-school level stuff, yet with NO significant funding for aging research, it remains undone. Note my prior posting explaining my inability even to find a source of used mice for kids to use in high-school anti-aging experiments, all while university labs are now killing their vast numbers of such mice. So long as things remain THIS broken, anything that isn't part of the solution simply becomes a part of the very big problem, AIs included. The best that an AI could seemingly do is to pronounce Fund and facilitate basic aging research and then suspend execution pending an interrupt indicating that the needed experiments have been done. Could you provide some hint as to where you are going with this? Steve *agi* | Archives https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ | Modifyhttps://www.listbox.com/member/?;Your Subscription http://www.listbox.com --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Compressed Cross-Indexed Concepts
[from: Concept-Rich Mathematics Instruction] Teacher: Very good. Now, look at this drawing and explain what you see. [Draws.] Debora: It's a pie with three pieces. Teacher: Tell us about the pieces. Debora: Three thirds. Teachers: What is the difference among the pieces? Debora: This is the largest third, and here is the smallest . . . Sound familiar? Have you ever wondered why students often understand mathematics in a very rudimentary and prototypical way, why even rich and exciting hands-on types of active learning do not always result in real learning of new concepts? From the psycho-educational perspective, these are the critical questions. In other words, epistemology is valuable to the extent that it helps us find ways to enable students who come with preconceived and misconceived ideas to understand a framework of scientific and mathematical concepts. Constructivism: A New Perspective At the dawn of behaviorism, constructivism became the most dominant epistemology in education. The purest forms of this philosophy profess that knowledge is not passively received either through the senses or by way of communication, just as meaning is not explicitly out there for grabs. Rather, constructivists generally agree that knowledge is actively built up by a cognizing human who needs to adapt to what is fit and viable (von Glasersfeld, 1995). Thus, there is no dispute among constructivists over the premise that one's knowledge is in a constant state of flux because humans are subject to an ever-changing reality (Jaworski, 1994, p. 16). Although constructivists generally regard understanding as the outcome of an active process, constructivists still argue over the nature of the process of knowing. Is knowing simply a matter of recall? Does learning new concepts reflect additive or structural cognitive changes? Is the process of knowing concepts built from the bottom up, or can it be a top-down process? How does new conceptual knowledge depend on experience? How does conceptual knowledge relate to procedural knowledge? And, can teachers mediate conceptual development? | Concept-Rich Mathematics Instruction Is Learning New Concepts Simply a Mechanism of Memorization and Recall? Science and mathematics educators have become increasingly aware that our understanding of conceptual change is at least as important as the analysis of the concepts themselves. In fact, a plethora of research has established that concepts are mental structures of intellectual relationships, not simply a subject matter. The research indicates that the mental structures of intellectual relationships that make up mental concepts organize human experiences and human memory (Bartsch, 1998). Therefore, conceptual changes represent structural cognitive changes, not simply additive changes. Based on the research in cognitive psychology, the attention of research in education has been shifting from the content (e.g., mathematical concepts) to the mental predicates, language, and preconcepts. Despite the research, many teachers continue to approach new concepts as if they were simply addons to their students' existing knowledge-a subject of memorization and recall. This practice may well be one of the causes of misconceptions in mathematics. Structural Cognitive Change The notion of structural cognitive change, or schematic change, was first introduced in the field of psychology (by Bartlett, who studied memory in the 1930s). It became one of the basic tenets of constructivism. Researchers in mathematics education picked up on this term and have been leaning heavily on it since the 1960s, following Skemp (1962), Minsky (1975), and Davis (1984). The generally accepted idea among researchers in the field, as stated by Skemp (1986, p. 43), is that in mathematics, to understand something is to assimilate it into an appropriate schema. A structural cognitive change is not merely an appendage. It involves the whole network of interrelated operational and conceptual schemata. Structural changes are pervasive, central, and permanent. The first characteristic of structural change refers to its pervasive nature. That is, new experiences do not have a limited effect, but cause the entire cognitive structure to rearrange itself. Vygotsky (1986, p. 167) argued, It was shown and proved experimentally that mental development does not coincide with the development of separate psychological functions, but rather depends on changing relations between them. The development of each function, in turn, depends upon the progress in the development of the interfunctional system. From: Jim Bromer Sent: Monday, August 09, 2010 11:11 PM To: agi Subject: [agi] Compressed Cross-Indexed Concepts On Mon, Aug 9, 2010 at 4:57 PM, John G. Rose johnr...@polyplexic.com wrote: -Original Message- From: Jim Bromer [mailto:jimbro...@gmail.com] how would these diverse
Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
Ben, On Tue, Aug 10, 2010 at 8:44 AM, Ben Goertzel b...@goertzel.org wrote: I'm writing an article on the topic for H+ Magazine, which will appear in the next couple weeks ... I'll post a link to it when it appears I'm not advocating applying AI in the absence of new experiments of course. I've been working closely with Genescient, applying AI tech to analyze the genomics of their long-lived superflies, so part of my message is about the virtuous cycle achievable via synergizing AI data analysis with carefully-designed experimental evolution of model organisms... I should dredge up and forward past threads with them. There are some flaws in their chain of reasoning, so that it won't be all that simple to sort the few relevant from the many irrelevant mutations. There is both a huge amount of noise, and irrelevant adaptations to their environment and their treatment. Even when the relevant mutations are eventually identified, it isn't clear how that will map to usable therapies for the existing population. Perhaps you remember the old Star Trek episode about the long-lived population that was still locked in a war after hundreds of years? The episode devolved into a dispute over the potential value of this discovery - was there something valuable in the environment, or did they just evolve to live longer? Here, the long-lived population isn't even human. Further, most of the things that kill us operate WAY too slowly to affect fruit flies, though there are some interesting dual-affecting problems. Unfortunately, it isn't as practical to autopsy fruit flies as it is to autopsy people to see what killed them. As I have posted in the past, what we have here in the present human population is about the equivalent of a fruit fly population that was bred for the shortest possible lifespan. Our social practices could hardly do worse. Our present challenge is to get to where fruit flies were before Rose first bred them for long life. I strongly suspect that we have some early-killer mutations, e.g. to people off as quickly as possible after they pass child-bearing age, which itself is probably being shortened through our bizarre social habits of mating like-aged people. Genescient's approach holds no promise of identifying THOSE genes, and identifying the other genes won't help at all until those killer genes are first silenced. In short, there are some really serious challenges to Genescient's approach. I expect success for several other quarters long before Genescient bears real-world usable fruit. I suspect that these challenges, along with the ubiquitous shortage of funding will keep Genescient out of producing real-world usable results pretty much forever. Future AGI output: Fund aging research. Update on studying more of Burzynski's papers: His is not a cancer cure at all. What he is doing is removing gene-silencing methylization from the DNA, and letting nature take its course, e.g. having their immune systems kill the cancer via aptosis. In short, it is a real-world anti-aging approach that has snuck in under the radar. OF COURSE any real-world working anti-aging approach would kill cancer! How good is his present product? Who knows? It sure looks to me like this is a valid approach, and I suspect that any bugs will get worked out in time. WATCH THIS. This looks to me like it will work in the real-world long before any other of the present popular approaches stand a chance of working. After all, it sure seems to be working on some people with really extreme gene silencing - called cancer. Steve --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
On 10 August 2010 16:44, Ben Goertzel b...@goertzel.org wrote: I'm writing an article on the topic for H+ Magazine, which will appear in the next couple weeks ... I'll post a link to it when it appears I'm not advocating applying AI in the absence of new experiments of course. I've been working closely with Genescient, applying AI tech to analyze the genomics of their long-lived superflies, so part of my message is about the virtuous cycle achievable via synergizing AI data analysis with carefully-designed experimental evolution of model organisms... Probably if I was going to apply AI in a medical context I'd prioritize those conditions which are both common and either fatal or have a severe impact on quality of life. Also worthwhile would be using AI to try to discover drugs which have an equivalent effect to existing known ones but can be manufactured at a significantly lower cost, such that they are brought within the means of a larger fraction of the population. Investigating aging is perfectly legitimate, but if you're trying to maximize your personal utility I'd regard it as a low priority compared to other more urgent medical issues which cause premature deaths. Also in the endeavor to extend life we need not focus entirely upon medical aspects. The organizational problems of delivering known medications on a large scale is also a problem which AI could perhaps be used to optimize. The way in which things like this are currently organized seems to be based upon some combination of tradition and intuitive hunches, so there may be low hanging fruit to be obtained here. For example, if an epidemic breaks out, why should you vaccinate first? If you have access to a social graph (from Facebook, or wherever) it's probably possible to calculate an optimal strategy. --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
The think the biggest thing to remember here is that general AI could be applied to many different problems in parallel by many different people. They would help with many aspects of the problem solving process, not just a single one and certainly not just applied to a single experiment/study. I'm confident that Ben is aware of this On Tue, Aug 10, 2010 at 1:43 PM, Bob Mottram fuzz...@gmail.com wrote: On 10 August 2010 16:44, Ben Goertzel b...@goertzel.org wrote: I'm writing an article on the topic for H+ Magazine, which will appear in the next couple weeks ... I'll post a link to it when it appears I'm not advocating applying AI in the absence of new experiments of course. I've been working closely with Genescient, applying AI tech to analyze the genomics of their long-lived superflies, so part of my message is about the virtuous cycle achievable via synergizing AI data analysis with carefully-designed experimental evolution of model organisms... Probably if I was going to apply AI in a medical context I'd prioritize those conditions which are both common and either fatal or have a severe impact on quality of life. Also worthwhile would be using AI to try to discover drugs which have an equivalent effect to existing known ones but can be manufactured at a significantly lower cost, such that they are brought within the means of a larger fraction of the population. Investigating aging is perfectly legitimate, but if you're trying to maximize your personal utility I'd regard it as a low priority compared to other more urgent medical issues which cause premature deaths. Also in the endeavor to extend life we need not focus entirely upon medical aspects. The organizational problems of delivering known medications on a large scale is also a problem which AI could perhaps be used to optimize. The way in which things like this are currently organized seems to be based upon some combination of tradition and intuitive hunches, so there may be low hanging fruit to be obtained here. For example, if an epidemic breaks out, why should you vaccinate first? If you have access to a social graph (from Facebook, or wherever) it's probably possible to calculate an optimal strategy. --- 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 --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
On Tue, Aug 10, 2010 at 6:25 AM, Steve Richfield wrote: Note my prior posting explaining my inability even to find a source of used mice for kids to use in high-school anti-aging experiments, all while university labs are now killing their vast numbers of such mice. So long as things remain THIS broken, anything that isn't part of the solution simply becomes a part of the very big problem, AIs included. You might be inerested in this- I've been putting together an adopt-a-lab-rat program that is actually an adoption program for lab mice. In some cases mice that are used as a control group in experiments are then discarded at the end of the program because, honestly, their lifetime is over more or less, so the idea is that some people might be interested in adopting these mice. Of course, you can also just pony up the $15 and get one from Jackson Labs. I haven't fully launced adopt-a-lab-rat yet because I am still trying to figure out how to avoid ending up in a situation where I have hundreds of rats and rodents running around my apartment and I get the short end of the stick (oops). - Bryan http://heybryan.org/ 1 512 203 0507 --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
On 10 August 2010 18:43, Bob Mottram fuzz...@gmail.com wrote: here. For example, if an epidemic breaks out, why should you vaccinate first? That should have been who rather than why :-) Just thinking a little further, in hand waving mode, If something like the common cold were added as a status within social networks, and everyone was on the network it might even be possible to eliminate this disease simply by getting people to avoid those who are known to have it for a certain period of time - a sort of internet enabled smart avoidance strategy. This wouldn't be a cure, but it could severely hamper the disease transmission mechanism, perhaps even to the extent of driving it to extinction. --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
I should dredge up and forward past threads with them. There are some flaws in their chain of reasoning, so that it won't be all that simple to sort the few relevant from the many irrelevant mutations. There is both a huge amount of noise, and irrelevant adaptations to their environment and their treatment. They have evolved many different populations in parallel, using the same fitness criterion. This provides powerful noise filtering Even when the relevant mutations are eventually identified, it isn't clear how that will map to usable therapies for the existing population. yes, that's a complex matter Further, most of the things that kill us operate WAY too slowly to affect fruit flies, though there are some interesting dual-affecting problems. Fruit flies get all the major ailments that kill people frequently, except cancer. heart disease, neurodegenerative disease, respiratory problems, immune problems, etc. As I have posted in the past, what we have here in the present human population is about the equivalent of a fruit fly population that was bred for the shortest possible lifespan. Certainly not. We have those fruit fly populations also, and analysis of their genetics refutes your claim ;p ... ben g --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Re: [agi] Anyone going to the Singularity Summit?
Bob, their are serious issues with such a suggestion. The biggest issue, is that there is a good chance it wouldn't work because diseases, including the common cold, have incubation times. So, you may not have any symptoms at all, yet you can pass it on to other people. And even if we did know who was sick, are you really going to stay home for 2 weeks every time you get sick? If I were an employer, I would rather have you come to work when you feel up to it. Another point I've given to germaphobes is that let's say you are successful at avoiding as many possible germs as possible and avoid getting sick as much as possible. That means that you are likely not immune to some common colds and such that you should be. So, when you are old and less capable, your immune system will not be able to fight off the infection and you will die an early death. Dave On Tue, Aug 10, 2010 at 1:51 PM, Bob Mottram fuzz...@gmail.com wrote: On 10 August 2010 18:43, Bob Mottram fuzz...@gmail.com wrote: here. For example, if an epidemic breaks out, why should you vaccinate first? That should have been who rather than why :-) Just thinking a little further, in hand waving mode, If something like the common cold were added as a status within social networks, and everyone was on the network it might even be possible to eliminate this disease simply by getting people to avoid those who are known to have it for a certain period of time - a sort of internet enabled smart avoidance strategy. This wouldn't be a cure, but it could severely hamper the disease transmission mechanism, perhaps even to the extent of driving it to extinction. --- 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 --- 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=8660244id_secret=8660244-6e7fb59c Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
