On 7/2/07, Stathis Papaioannou <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
On 02/07/07, Jef Allbright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> While I agree with you in regard to decoupling intelligence and any
> particular goals, this doesn't mean goals can be random or arbitrary.
> To the extent that striving toward goals (more realistically:
> promotion of values) is supportable by intelligence, the values-model
> must be coherent.
I'm not sure what you mean by "coherent". If I make it my life's work
to collect seashells, because I want to have the world's biggest
seashell collection, how does that rate as a goal in terms of
arbitrariness and coherence?
To be meaningful (of course necessarily subjectively), a goal is an
expected outcome of the effective expression of an agent's values.
Our values do not exist in isolation; they represent a complex model
of a desired state, driving our actions such that we affect our
environment in the direction of reducing the difference between the
perceived model and our values model. Wash, rinse, and repeat
continuously.
It can be apparent that a more coherent values matrix is more
effectively realized; and a less coherent model tends to be at odds
with itself. It's important to note that for any adaptive system -- I
mean, organism -- while actions are always driven by the present
model, the model continues to be updated as a result of selection for
"what works."
A "goal" of having the world's biggest seashell collection may be seen
more effectively as expression of a set of values, dominated perhaps
in the case of a human primate by well-known evolved biases toward
"more is better" and "special is better". To the extent that the
overall "values-model" (of which these particular values are a part)
is coherent, these values will tend to be effectively expressed.
- Jef
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