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i think googling it would be helpful, but in an overly general way, human exceptionalism is the idwa that there is sometjing unique or special associated with t

i think googling it would be helpful, but in an overly general way, human exceptionalism is the idwa that there is sometjing unique or special associated with the human experience or with human experience. The broader point i was making in the original comment is agaisnt this sentiment. Humans abiluty to unserstand why things happen bears little relevance to them happening. We now know little if anything about why the human consious experience happens or why it works, yet here we are. Humans can make gun powder or a water wheel with no understanding of electron orbital theory or an concept of gravity that outlines orbital mechanics. The shocking effectiveness of piling up large amounts of complexity seems to be sufficient many of the phenomena that humans seem to desure a much more mechanistic explanatiom for. In this sense, it could be that complexity is all you need. and to bring it full circle, what about the complexity we see in non human, non animal systems? if complexity is all you need, what might be happening beyond the veil of human assumptioms around the consious experience?

YeGoblynQueenne 4y ago
Well, I don't think that complexity "is all you need". "All you need" for what, anyway? I think I understand what you mean by human exceptionalism, but I think it's besides the point. We don't even understand the intelligence of unicellular organisms, or insects. We have no "AI" that's half as smart as a cockroach. The point is, there was never anything consequential that we invented, or discovered, all by chance. People always had some understanding of how things work, even if it wasn't understanding in the context of modern science, so even when it was only empirical knowledge, not formalised in the language of mathematics; even if it wasn't full knowledge, and yes, there are still many things we don't quite understand today. Off the top of my head, if I got that right, we don't understand exactly why or how anesthesia works. And yet, we have trained professionals who study and practice anesthesia, and they generally manage to avoid killing their patients, most of the time. Unfortunately, we have nothing like that about intelligence. There's people studying the subject, coming at it from many different points (insect intelligence, IQ metrics, psychology, neuroscience, what have you) but there is not a body of knowledge that we can apply practically to show how intelligence works, and what happens when we do this, or what happens when we do that, to it. Which means, if we do achieve "AGI" or whatchamacallit, at the present time it's not going to be because someone knew how to do it, but because someone got really lucky (or unlucky, perhaps).

YeGoblynQueenne 4y ago

Well, I don't think that complexity "is all you need". "All you need" for what, anyway? I think I understand what you mean by human exceptionalism, but I think it's besides the point. We don't even understand the intelligence of unicellular organisms, or insects. We have no "AI" that's half as smart as a cockroach. The point is, there was never anything consequential that we invented, or discovered, all by chance. People always had some understanding of how things work, even if it wasn't understanding in the context of modern science, so even when it was only empirical knowledge, not formalised in the language of mathematics; even if it wasn't full knowledge, and yes, there are still many things we don't quite understand today. Off the top of my head, if I got that right, we don't understand exactly why or how anesthesia works. And yet, we have trained professionals who study and practice anesthesia, and they generally manage to avoid killing their patients, most of the time. Unfortunately, we have nothing like that about intelligence. There's people studying the subject, coming at it from many different points (insect intelligence, IQ metrics, psychology, neuroscience, what have you) but there is not a body of knowledge that we can apply practically to show how intelligence works, and what happens when we do this, or what happens when we do that, to it. Which means, if we do achieve "AGI" or whatchamacallit, at the present time it's not going to be because someone knew how to do it, but because someone got really lucky (or unlucky, perhaps).