3 ms·
If you have any better ideas, the scientific community would legitimately love to hear them. It’s not like nobody realizes that we don’t have flawless definiti
by stouset 6y ago
If you have any better ideas, the scientific community would legitimately love to hear them.
It’s not like nobody realizes that we don’t have flawless definitions for “self-aware”, “intelligent”, or even “life”. Or that the experiments we devise to test for these things come from our own experiences and bias, and might exclude creatures with novel presentations of these traits.
But they’re the best we have for now. And smart people have spent countless lifetimes trying to improve upon what we have, attempting to broaden these categories and their testing apparatuses without expanding the definitions past the point of usefulness.
So, yes, we get it. Everyone knows our tests and definitions aren’t perfect. We know they’ll exclude life forms with presentations of these traits that we haven’t even conceived of. Not only doesn’t science have all the answers yet, but it hasn’t even agreed on the wording of the questions yet. Pointing this out for the thirteen trillionth time just isn’t useful or insightful.
- dfischer 6y agoIf it keeps hurting, it should keep being mentioned. When things that hurt are turned into silence, then things don't change that can stop hurt. I understand your point though, and I'm sorry if it came off as an attack. It's a criticism rooted in a few things. I typed up more here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24601665 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24601665
- smallnamespace 6y agoI mean, would you go around reminding your friends of their shortcomings and then reminding them how helpful your feedback is? Sometimes people are well aware of the problems and are actively trying to solve them.
- dfischer 6y agoI won’t remind them of my feedback but I’d never give up on telling them where they should improve.
- stouset 6y agoMentioning it would be helpful if this was something the relevant scientific community wasn’t already keenly aware of. “We don’t have all-encompassing definitions nor tests of self-awareness” isn’t something people have forgotten— it’s virtually the most well-known open question in the entire field! It’s like popping into a discussion of general relativity and “helpfully” chiming in with the criticism that “But we know GR must be wrong, since it’s incompatible with quantum mechanics.”
- dfischer 6y agoFair enough - however I haven’t heard the scientific community talk much of this problem. The unfortunate side of gated communities and information. I will be more mindful of my ranting. Thanks for sharing.