3 ms·

>We can measure the speed impulses travel through neurons, and compare that to, say, the speed of electrical impulses through silicon or light through fiber. T

>We can measure the speed impulses travel through neurons, and compare that to, say, the speed of electrical impulses through silicon or light through fiber. This assumes that all the processing that human brain does is by sending signals across the neurons. Which we really don't know. Right? >We can look at other evolved/biological capabilities, like swimming or flying, and compare them to state-of-the-art artificial analogs.. Do we yet have an airplane yet that can come close to the efficiency of the most clumsiest of the birds?

hughes 9y ago
> Do we yet have an airplane yet that can come close to the efficiency of the most clumsiest of the birds? Regardless of efficiency, we have certainly exceeded the range, cargo capacity, top speed, and passenger space of most birds. Similarly, even if signal propagation in the brain is not understood, we could conceivably beat the brain in other metrics.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  > Regardless of efficiency, we have certainly exceeded the range, cargo capacity, top speed, and passenger space of most birds. This is the core point. Our technology may still suck compared to nature, but we've been beating nature consistently since before humans learned to write, because we don't have the same set of constraints that natural biological systems have. So just like we can make inefficient flying machines that beat nature on most other conceivable metrics, we could presumably build an energy-inefficient but smarter mind at some point.
  - type0 9y ago
    I would say the progress that humans have achieved by now was by hacking the Nature, we were able to do this because we are part of the Nature. so in order to produce the AI that would be capable of progress that humans are to do it needs to be a part of Nature. Such wet-ware computers already exist, look up DNA based computers, but those are highly constrained (and their io is terrible). The sort of intelligence we can get to the wet-ware based AI is probably will be better spend on improving our own intelligence by hacking own our brains. > we could presumably build an energy-inefficient but smarter mind at some point. So this smarter mind will probably be our own, but that would also be achieved by some sort of artificial means.
    - TeMPOraL 9y ago
      Saying that "progress that humans have achieved by now was by hacking the Nature" implies that planes and computers are "hacking Nature" too, so this doesn't preclude a silicon brain, nor does it suggest the AI will have to be biology-based. Planes aren't biology based; in fact, we only cracked powered flight after we stopped trying to mimic birds. > So this smarter mind will probably be our own It's plausible for me too, but not because we can't do stuff outside what evolution did - just because it's usually easier to hack an existing system than to build a new one from scratch.
      - type0 9y ago
        > hacking the Nature" implies that planes and computers are "hacking Nature" too Sure it does, because physical laws are a fundamental part of Nature
        TeMPOraL 9y ago
        Nobody tries to build an AI that breaks laws of physics by virtue of existing :). If we're extending the term "Nature" to mean all reality, then silicon brains are a part of nature too.
- babyrainbow 9y ago
  >we could conceivably beat the brain in other metrics. Sure, the very first calculators beat brain in some metrics. But we are not talking about those metrics here.
_greim_ 9y ago
> Do we yet have an airplane yet that can come close to the efficiency of the most clumsiest of the birds? The author makes a good point about intelligence not being one-dimensional, and I think the same thing holds for flying ability. Efficiency is one dimension, but you also have speed, range and so forth.
_greim_ 9y ago
> This assumes that all the processing that human brain does is by sending signals across the neurons. Which we really don't know. Right? It doesn't need to assume all, just some non-trivial amount. I don't know the ratio of inter-neuron to intra-neuron processing in brains, or if such a metric even exists. But it seems theoretically possible at least to measure the computing power of a neuron in isolation, and see if artificial analogs exist (or could be built) that exceed that by some margin. Ultimately we're just looking for avenues of evidence to explore.

hughes 9y ago

> Do we yet have an airplane yet that can come close to the efficiency of the most clumsiest of the birds? Regardless of efficiency, we have certainly exceeded the range, cargo capacity, top speed, and passenger space of most birds. Similarly, even if signal propagation in the brain is not understood, we could conceivably beat the brain in other metrics.

TeMPOraL 9y ago
> Regardless of efficiency, we have certainly exceeded the range, cargo capacity, top speed, and passenger space of most birds. This is the core point. Our technology may still suck compared to nature, but we've been beating nature consistently since before humans learned to write, because we don't have the same set of constraints that natural biological systems have. So just like we can make inefficient flying machines that beat nature on most other conceivable metrics, we could presumably build an energy-inefficient but smarter mind at some point.
- type0 9y ago
  I would say the progress that humans have achieved by now was by hacking the Nature, we were able to do this because we are part of the Nature. so in order to produce the AI that would be capable of progress that humans are to do it needs to be a part of Nature. Such wet-ware computers already exist, look up DNA based computers, but those are highly constrained (and their io is terrible). The sort of intelligence we can get to the wet-ware based AI is probably will be better spend on improving our own intelligence by hacking own our brains. > we could presumably build an energy-inefficient but smarter mind at some point. So this smarter mind will probably be our own, but that would also be achieved by some sort of artificial means.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    Saying that "progress that humans have achieved by now was by hacking the Nature" implies that planes and computers are "hacking Nature" too, so this doesn't preclude a silicon brain, nor does it suggest the AI will have to be biology-based. Planes aren't biology based; in fact, we only cracked powered flight after we stopped trying to mimic birds. > So this smarter mind will probably be our own It's plausible for me too, but not because we can't do stuff outside what evolution did - just because it's usually easier to hack an existing system than to build a new one from scratch.
    - type0 9y ago
      > hacking the Nature" implies that planes and computers are "hacking Nature" too Sure it does, because physical laws are a fundamental part of Nature
      - TeMPOraL 9y ago
        Nobody tries to build an AI that breaks laws of physics by virtue of existing :). If we're extending the term "Nature" to mean all reality, then silicon brains are a part of nature too.
babyrainbow 9y ago
>we could conceivably beat the brain in other metrics. Sure, the very first calculators beat brain in some metrics. But we are not talking about those metrics here.

_greim_ 9y ago

> Do we yet have an airplane yet that can come close to the efficiency of the most clumsiest of the birds? The author makes a good point about intelligence not being one-dimensional, and I think the same thing holds for flying ability. Efficiency is one dimension, but you also have speed, range and so forth.

_greim_ 9y ago

> This assumes that all the processing that human brain does is by sending signals across the neurons. Which we really don't know. Right? It doesn't need to assume all, just some non-trivial amount. I don't know the ratio of inter-neuron to intra-neuron processing in brains, or if such a metric even exists. But it seems theoretically possible at least to measure the computing power of a neuron in isolation, and see if artificial analogs exist (or could be built) that exceed that by some margin. Ultimately we're just looking for avenues of evidence to explore.