7 ms·

People in this debate miss a subtle issue, and it causes no end of confusion. The subtle issue is this. There is a difference between (1) accidentally building

by xamuel 7y ago

People in this debate miss a subtle issue, and it causes no end of confusion. The subtle issue is this. There is a difference between (1) accidentally building a computer which happens to think, and (2) intentionally building a computer which thinks, and knowing that it thinks. Obviously (1) is possible, because for any particular configuration of atoms, it is theoretically possible for someone to assemble atoms together in that configuration. I could randomly put atoms together and, by sheer luck, assemble a living, breathing Abraham Lincoln. But since it happened by random chance, I wouldn't know for sure that this was really a living, breathing Abraham Lincoln. I might observe it for awhile and notice that, golly, it sure does seem to be a living, breathing Abraham Lincoln. But I could never rule out the possibility that it only looks like that initially and that it'll eventually collapse or fall into some infinite loop or something. Intentionally building a machine and KNOWING that it has such-and-such properties of a thinking machine, is much more interesting. Such KNOWING is, itself, an act of thinking, and so there arises an interplay between the thinking of the created machine, and the thinking of the creator. Then you can start asking questions about whether the created machine, being a thinker, could also itself intentionally create another thinking machine, and so on. If you're tired of the endless non-productive debate about whether thinking machines are possible, and you'd like to go to the next level, and take steps toward actually quantifying things, I'd invite you to read some papers I've written on the subject. To lessen the learning curve, here are some very approachable slides, and if you like those slides, you can click through to one of the papers. https://semitrivial.github.io/MeasuringIntelligence2019.pdf https://semitrivial.github.io/MeasuringIntelligence2019.pdf

atomack 7y ago
I'm not sure (1) is 'obviously possible'. Supposing there's a finite number of atomic configurations that produce Abraham Lincoln, there's still an infinite number of atomic configurations so you're probability is strictly zero, no? It's not even an 'age of the universe to achieve' type event. And that assumes that your random throwing together of atoms includes the physical preconditions to create an Abraham Lincoln. For instance, if you were sitting in the middle of a black hole randomly assembling atoms I'm pretty sure it's physically impossible to create an Abraham Lincoln.
jbattle 7y ago
Isn't this the same as the "problem of other minds"? How do I know that YOU mr xamuel are actually sentient?! If we get to the point where a machine demonstrates "sufficiently" complex behavior, society will quickly accept them as sentient. This is something we are primed to do. Hell, people ascribe all sorts of intentionality to their dog. After a few years, society at large will accept these machines as sentient, and it'll be the same philosophers arguing about "but are they REALLY sentient" that have been arguing the problem of other minds since ... Gorgias in 4th century BC? You raise a really interesting point / distinction. I'm just arguing that society will race past this question without hesitation.
- xamuel 7y ago
  Bonus points for mentioning Gorgias :) Re: wouldn't society race past this question without hesitation [if someone got lucky and produced what appears to be strong AI by just randomly throwing atoms together]? Yes, and in fact some people would argue that is precisely what has in fact happened, the random atom-throwing-together process being called "evolution". And as you point out, philosophers would continue to debate about "is it REALLY strong AI?", just as nowadays philosophers debate about whether humans are machines or not. These hypothetical debates will always exist, nothing will ever change that, not even if someone randomly creates a true strong AI by sheer luck. My point is that there's a whole other half of the field, which ISN'T doomed to perpetual fruitless philosophical debating. The question of whether intelligent machines can exist is one that is doomed to fruitless debates forever. But the question of whether we can build specific machines and know with mathematical certainty how quantitatively intelligent they are---that is a much more fruitful area where progress can be made, theorems can be proved, mathematics can be applied, etc.
  - TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
    Unfortunately there's no agreement that we can actually quantify intelligence in a useful way, and believing that "ability to reason" and intelligence are synonymous, never mind evidence of sentience, is clearly incorrect. Whatever human intelligence is, it has multiple dimensions, and being "able to reason" - whatever you assume that means - is a tiny element of a bigger picture. It's practically a universal law of AI that proponents of AI inevitably understand AI in terms of their own niche interests - whether those are chess, go, e-sports, music, or driving. Only a field like CS could conceive of a test where the ability to emulate a conversation by typing lines of text on a terminal might be considered an indicator of operational sentience. In reality all but the absolutely dumbest humans can operate a body fairly effortlessly, feed themselves and keep themselves clean, express characteristic preferences and act on them with agency, read and respond to human expressions and emotional cues, communicate internal emotional and psychological states verbally and non-verbally, improvise solutions to simple problems, maintain a fairly consistent emotional and psychological outlook that nonetheless develops over time, and make occasional surprising and unexpected - but not inhumanly weird - statements, observations, and actions. How much of that is considered "being able to reason"? If there's a way to quantify ability in all of the above, I'm not aware of it.
MaxBarraclough 7y ago
> I could never rule out the possibility that it only looks like that initially and that it'll eventually collapse or fall into some infinite loop or something I don't put much stock in that possibility. Physicalism essentially closes the door on p-zombies, no?
- xamuel 7y ago
  Until we solve the hard problem of consciousness, the door on p-zombies is wide open. It's arrogant to assume that just because you are conscious, everyone else must be conscious like you. Maybe consciousness is caused by a particular benevolent parasite living in your gut, and whoever lacks that parasite lacks consciosness.
  - MaxBarraclough 7y ago
    > It's arrogant to assume that just because you are conscious, everyone else must be conscious like you. It's far more arrogant to assume you're the odd one out. There's a reason we never use that kind of thinking. The following reasoning is clearly absurd: I think I'm immune from radiation sickness. I know we have no evidence that anyone in history has been immune, but I've never been exposed, so I'm going to assume I'm immune. > Maybe consciousness is caused by a particular benevolent parasite living in your gut, and whoever lacks that parasite lacks consciosness. You could go with that explanation, but it's far more complex than necessary, which is a good indicator that it's not true. A physicist won't be able to disprove the suggestion that gravity will only exist for as long as the Invisible Pink Unicorn wills it to exist. So what? We can be pretty confident that consciousness arises from the normal activity of the brain. We can temporarily shut it down with anaesthetics, and see the diminished activity in parts of the brain.
    - xamuel 7y ago
      >It's far more arrogant to assume you're the odd one out. I didn't say you should assume that either. You shouldn't assume either one until you have some reason to do so. >A physicist won't be able to disprove the suggestion that gravity will only exist for as long as the Invisible Pink Unicorn wills it to exist. So what? If I had some way of knowing which people are conscious, and I observed that everyone currently living and everyone in the past was always conscious, then it would indeed be silly for me to suggest that tomorrow many non-conscious people will be born --- as silly as your Invisible Pink Unicorn example. But the fact is, I do NOT know that anyone other than myself is conscious. I assume they are for the sake of adjudicating ethical dilemmas, but I only actually have that empirical data for myself. >We can temporarily shut [consciousness] down with anaesthetics, and see the diminished activity in parts of the brain. Here you seem to be assuming consciousness is identified with certain brain activities, but that's begging the question. For example, that would rule out computer simulations from being conscious, since you couldn't detect said brain activity in said computer. But it's far from settled whether or not consciousness is impossible in a computer simulation, in fact, many people think it IS possible. So unless you know something a lot of experts don't know, there isn't enough evidence to equate consciousness with certain brain activity.

by xamuel 7y ago

atomack 7y ago

I'm not sure (1) is 'obviously possible'. Supposing there's a finite number of atomic configurations that produce Abraham Lincoln, there's still an infinite number of atomic configurations so you're probability is strictly zero, no? It's not even an 'age of the universe to achieve' type event. And that assumes that your random throwing together of atoms includes the physical preconditions to create an Abraham Lincoln. For instance, if you were sitting in the middle of a black hole randomly assembling atoms I'm pretty sure it's physically impossible to create an Abraham Lincoln.

jbattle 7y ago

Isn't this the same as the "problem of other minds"? How do I know that YOU mr xamuel are actually sentient?! If we get to the point where a machine demonstrates "sufficiently" complex behavior, society will quickly accept them as sentient. This is something we are primed to do. Hell, people ascribe all sorts of intentionality to their dog. After a few years, society at large will accept these machines as sentient, and it'll be the same philosophers arguing about "but are they REALLY sentient" that have been arguing the problem of other minds since ... Gorgias in 4th century BC? You raise a really interesting point / distinction. I'm just arguing that society will race past this question without hesitation.

xamuel 7y ago
Bonus points for mentioning Gorgias :) Re: wouldn't society race past this question without hesitation [if someone got lucky and produced what appears to be strong AI by just randomly throwing atoms together]? Yes, and in fact some people would argue that is precisely what has in fact happened, the random atom-throwing-together process being called "evolution". And as you point out, philosophers would continue to debate about "is it REALLY strong AI?", just as nowadays philosophers debate about whether humans are machines or not. These hypothetical debates will always exist, nothing will ever change that, not even if someone randomly creates a true strong AI by sheer luck. My point is that there's a whole other half of the field, which ISN'T doomed to perpetual fruitless philosophical debating. The question of whether intelligent machines can exist is one that is doomed to fruitless debates forever. But the question of whether we can build specific machines and know with mathematical certainty how quantitatively intelligent they are---that is a much more fruitful area where progress can be made, theorems can be proved, mathematics can be applied, etc.
- TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
  Unfortunately there's no agreement that we can actually quantify intelligence in a useful way, and believing that "ability to reason" and intelligence are synonymous, never mind evidence of sentience, is clearly incorrect. Whatever human intelligence is, it has multiple dimensions, and being "able to reason" - whatever you assume that means - is a tiny element of a bigger picture. It's practically a universal law of AI that proponents of AI inevitably understand AI in terms of their own niche interests - whether those are chess, go, e-sports, music, or driving. Only a field like CS could conceive of a test where the ability to emulate a conversation by typing lines of text on a terminal might be considered an indicator of operational sentience. In reality all but the absolutely dumbest humans can operate a body fairly effortlessly, feed themselves and keep themselves clean, express characteristic preferences and act on them with agency, read and respond to human expressions and emotional cues, communicate internal emotional and psychological states verbally and non-verbally, improvise solutions to simple problems, maintain a fairly consistent emotional and psychological outlook that nonetheless develops over time, and make occasional surprising and unexpected - but not inhumanly weird - statements, observations, and actions. How much of that is considered "being able to reason"? If there's a way to quantify ability in all of the above, I'm not aware of it.

MaxBarraclough 7y ago

> I could never rule out the possibility that it only looks like that initially and that it'll eventually collapse or fall into some infinite loop or something I don't put much stock in that possibility. Physicalism essentially closes the door on p-zombies, no?

xamuel 7y ago
Until we solve the hard problem of consciousness, the door on p-zombies is wide open. It's arrogant to assume that just because you are conscious, everyone else must be conscious like you. Maybe consciousness is caused by a particular benevolent parasite living in your gut, and whoever lacks that parasite lacks consciosness.
- MaxBarraclough 7y ago
  > It's arrogant to assume that just because you are conscious, everyone else must be conscious like you. It's far more arrogant to assume you're the odd one out. There's a reason we never use that kind of thinking. The following reasoning is clearly absurd: I think I'm immune from radiation sickness. I know we have no evidence that anyone in history has been immune, but I've never been exposed, so I'm going to assume I'm immune. > Maybe consciousness is caused by a particular benevolent parasite living in your gut, and whoever lacks that parasite lacks consciosness. You could go with that explanation, but it's far more complex than necessary, which is a good indicator that it's not true. A physicist won't be able to disprove the suggestion that gravity will only exist for as long as the Invisible Pink Unicorn wills it to exist. So what? We can be pretty confident that consciousness arises from the normal activity of the brain. We can temporarily shut it down with anaesthetics, and see the diminished activity in parts of the brain.
  - xamuel 7y ago
    >It's far more arrogant to assume you're the odd one out. I didn't say you should assume that either. You shouldn't assume either one until you have some reason to do so. >A physicist won't be able to disprove the suggestion that gravity will only exist for as long as the Invisible Pink Unicorn wills it to exist. So what? If I had some way of knowing which people are conscious, and I observed that everyone currently living and everyone in the past was always conscious, then it would indeed be silly for me to suggest that tomorrow many non-conscious people will be born --- as silly as your Invisible Pink Unicorn example. But the fact is, I do NOT know that anyone other than myself is conscious. I assume they are for the sake of adjudicating ethical dilemmas, but I only actually have that empirical data for myself. >We can temporarily shut [consciousness] down with anaesthetics, and see the diminished activity in parts of the brain. Here you seem to be assuming consciousness is identified with certain brain activities, but that's begging the question. For example, that would rule out computer simulations from being conscious, since you couldn't detect said brain activity in said computer. But it's far from settled whether or not consciousness is impossible in a computer simulation, in fact, many people think it IS possible. So unless you know something a lot of experts don't know, there isn't enough evidence to equate consciousness with certain brain activity.