3 ms·

You seem to be having a lot of trouble grasping the concept of abstraction, which is absolutely fundamental to what we are talking about. Mathematics, logic an

You seem to be having a lot of trouble grasping the concept of abstraction, which is absolutely fundamental to what we are talking about. Mathematics, logic and computer science study abstractions, they do not study physical things. The mathematical fact that 1 + 1 = 2 is true regardless of whether we are counting apples or oranges. On the other hand 5 + 5 = 30 pounds is mathematically a non-sensical statement, even though there are physical objects for which it is true (ie. objects which happen to weigh 3 pounds). Computation is not a physical process any more than addition is a physical process. It is true that to actually perform either a physical instantiation is necessary but in the same way that the results of addition do not depend on what we are adding the results of computation do not depend on what kind of physical process we use to perform the computation. This was the whole point of my earlier water based computer example. Would it be correct, on the basis of that example, to say that the program "makes you wet" or that some computations make you wet ? No, such a statement would be as non-sensical as the statement that 5 + 5 = 30 pounds. Now the key thing is that when people make claims about computers being conscious those claims are usually based on what some program does (ie. what its inputs and outputs are), in other words a computational property of the program that would be the same regardless of what kind of computer it was executed on. The guy who claimed that LaMDA was conscious wasn't basing his claim on something specific about the kind of hardware it was running on, he was basing it on the program's inputs and outputs, which are indeed a computational property and therefore abstract.

simonh 4y ago
>It is true that to actually perform either a physical instantiation is necessary... That's all I'm saying. When you say 'computation is not a physical process', I think that's an ambiguous statement. The actual computation of something must be physically performed for it to occur, otherwise no computation takes place. >The guy who claimed that LaMDA was conscious wasn't basing his claim on something specific about the kind of hardware it was running on, he was basing it on the program's inputs and outputs, which are indeed a computational property and therefore abstract. The kind of hardware doesn't matter, absolutely, but there must be hardware. You can't say that an abstract object such as a hypothetical computer program, or even an actual computer program that is stored but not running, is conscious. In order to be conscious, it would have to actually run. Consciousness, like the actual process of computation, is not an abstract property. It must be an instantiated property (I would prefer to say an instantiated behaviour) of a real system. I think we can agree inputs are not conscious, nor are outputs, nor are both put together. What he was doing was inferring something, from those inputs and outputs, about the process that occurred in an actual computer to produce one from the other. That process is not abstract, it's a physical process. When it's physically happening there is (or might be hypothetically in the case of LaMDA) consciousness, when it's not happening there isn't.
- tgflynn 4y ago
  If you say that there is a property X of computation that occurs independently of how the computation is actually carried out, whether it's by a current generation CPU, hydraulics, lego blocks, someone writing values and following instructions on index cards or some other method that no one has even thought of yet then that property is an abstract property of computation. That's all the word "abstract" means in this context. What you are suggesting would be like saying that there's some property of addition that is not mathematical (because hopefully we agree that mathematics only studies abstract properties) but that you can only learn about by looking at all the different kinds of things that one can concretely apply addition to. I would argue that such a thing is implausible. It would be completely unlike anything that anyone has seen in the real world. One thing I think we do agree on is that conscious experiences are not abstract (very unlike the other person I've been exchanging comments with who denies that they even exist at all). Beyond that I argue that computation itself is entirely abstract and though I don't seem to be able to get you to admit that, I think most people, certainly most computer scientists would admit it readily. So what we're left with is a claim that an abstract process can produce something that is not abstract and such claims are just not plausible. That would be exactly like a computer simulation of the weather producing actual water.
  - simonh 4y ago
    >If you say that there is a property X of computation that occurs independently of how the computation is actually carried out... That's all the word "abstract" means in this context. Ok, that makes sense, sure. >...because hopefully we agree that mathematics only studies abstract properties... I can't agree, performing a calculation isn't an abstract concept, it's a physical process. It does map to abstract concepts though. >Beyond that I argue that computation itself is entirely abstract and though I don't seem to be able to get you to admit that, I think most people, certainly most computer scientists would admit it readily. That is not the case. The fact that computation is fundamentally a physical process is a core principle of several branches of physics and computer science: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computation https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspa.2014.0182 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspa.2014.018... Computers aren't abstract, they're real objects doing things in the real world. If the thing they are physically doing is not computation, what is it? >So what we're left with is a claim that an abstract process can produce something that is not abstract and such claims are just not plausible. That would be exactly like a computer simulation of the weather producing actual water. Abstractions cannot affect the real world, sure, so if computation is purely abstract how come your computer can display my message on your physical screen right now? How is that happening, if not by computation? You're really tangling yourself up in knots with this view of abstraction. You can map what happens in a computer against abstract concepts and abstract objects yes. You can also map operations in several different physical systems against the same abstract objects. That's what it means when we say computation is implementation independent. But it still needs to be implemented to actually happen. Previously you said this: >Computation is not a physical process any more than addition is a physical process. It is true that to actually perform either a physical instantiation is necessary... So it's not a physical process, but you can instantiate it. And it's purely abstract so can't affect the physical world. Yet here we are using computers. I'm lost, frankly.

simonh 4y ago

>It is true that to actually perform either a physical instantiation is necessary... That's all I'm saying. When you say 'computation is not a physical process', I think that's an ambiguous statement. The actual computation of something must be physically performed for it to occur, otherwise no computation takes place. >The guy who claimed that LaMDA was conscious wasn't basing his claim on something specific about the kind of hardware it was running on, he was basing it on the program's inputs and outputs, which are indeed a computational property and therefore abstract. The kind of hardware doesn't matter, absolutely, but there must be hardware. You can't say that an abstract object such as a hypothetical computer program, or even an actual computer program that is stored but not running, is conscious. In order to be conscious, it would have to actually run. Consciousness, like the actual process of computation, is not an abstract property. It must be an instantiated property (I would prefer to say an instantiated behaviour) of a real system. I think we can agree inputs are not conscious, nor are outputs, nor are both put together. What he was doing was inferring something, from those inputs and outputs, about the process that occurred in an actual computer to produce one from the other. That process is not abstract, it's a physical process. When it's physically happening there is (or might be hypothetically in the case of LaMDA) consciousness, when it's not happening there isn't.

tgflynn 4y ago
If you say that there is a property X of computation that occurs independently of how the computation is actually carried out, whether it's by a current generation CPU, hydraulics, lego blocks, someone writing values and following instructions on index cards or some other method that no one has even thought of yet then that property is an abstract property of computation. That's all the word "abstract" means in this context. What you are suggesting would be like saying that there's some property of addition that is not mathematical (because hopefully we agree that mathematics only studies abstract properties) but that you can only learn about by looking at all the different kinds of things that one can concretely apply addition to. I would argue that such a thing is implausible. It would be completely unlike anything that anyone has seen in the real world. One thing I think we do agree on is that conscious experiences are not abstract (very unlike the other person I've been exchanging comments with who denies that they even exist at all). Beyond that I argue that computation itself is entirely abstract and though I don't seem to be able to get you to admit that, I think most people, certainly most computer scientists would admit it readily. So what we're left with is a claim that an abstract process can produce something that is not abstract and such claims are just not plausible. That would be exactly like a computer simulation of the weather producing actual water.
- simonh 4y ago
  >If you say that there is a property X of computation that occurs independently of how the computation is actually carried out... That's all the word "abstract" means in this context. Ok, that makes sense, sure. >...because hopefully we agree that mathematics only studies abstract properties... I can't agree, performing a calculation isn't an abstract concept, it's a physical process. It does map to abstract concepts though. >Beyond that I argue that computation itself is entirely abstract and though I don't seem to be able to get you to admit that, I think most people, certainly most computer scientists would admit it readily. That is not the case. The fact that computation is fundamentally a physical process is a core principle of several branches of physics and computer science: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computation https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspa.2014.0182 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspa.2014.018... Computers aren't abstract, they're real objects doing things in the real world. If the thing they are physically doing is not computation, what is it? >So what we're left with is a claim that an abstract process can produce something that is not abstract and such claims are just not plausible. That would be exactly like a computer simulation of the weather producing actual water. Abstractions cannot affect the real world, sure, so if computation is purely abstract how come your computer can display my message on your physical screen right now? How is that happening, if not by computation? You're really tangling yourself up in knots with this view of abstraction. You can map what happens in a computer against abstract concepts and abstract objects yes. You can also map operations in several different physical systems against the same abstract objects. That's what it means when we say computation is implementation independent. But it still needs to be implemented to actually happen. Previously you said this: >Computation is not a physical process any more than addition is a physical process. It is true that to actually perform either a physical instantiation is necessary... So it's not a physical process, but you can instantiate it. And it's purely abstract so can't affect the physical world. Yet here we are using computers. I'm lost, frankly.