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> And, like it or not, we have a formal definition of reasoning and logic, and long expertise in analyzing how that works. Well then I guess all the humans in

by epups 3y ago

> And, like it or not, we have a formal definition of reasoning and logic, and long expertise in analyzing how that works. Well then I guess all the humans in this thread would come to the exact same conclusion, because according to some expectations we are perfectly consistent and capable of logical reasoning. How would you describe the process where if you add context to a prompt - ie, if you prod the AI in a certain direction - you can drastically influence its results? Is it not using this context as an "argument"? Sure, we know for a fact that all they are doing is exploring a certain corner of a high-dimensional space, and that prompting gets us closer to a desired spot where the right answers reside. If this is true, then at least some logic and reasoning is encoded in language. And if this is also true, then perhaps what humans are performing is a similar trick.

AstralStorm 3y ago
If so, then why ChatGPT gets stuck in a loop of producing the same wrong answers? And sometimes repeatedly producing new wrong ones? Does it immediately forget the context? It is being told how it is wrong and where in no uncertain terms. Yet it goes back to the same mistake, or skips steps for its reasoning convenience.
DonaldPShimoda 3y ago
> Well then I guess all the humans in this thread would come to the exact same conclusion, because according to some expectations we are perfectly consistent and capable of logical reasoning. You've missed the point (hopefully not intentionally). Neither I nor anybody else suggested that all humans must arrive at identical conclusions as one another for the process to be considered "reasoning". But any individual human should be self-consistent, which is what I would expect of a chatbot that "reasons". Because, allegedly, the bot keeps all of the prompts in the same context, suggesting a single continuous conversation with one "entity" rather than treating each response as a separate instance. So when the chatbot suddenly cannot back up its own prior conclusion, it's demonstrating a lack of self-consistency, which shows that it is not "reasoning" for any typical definition of the term. It has no self-awareness (nor can it, though AI proponents seem to claim otherwise).
- epups 3y ago
  > But any individual human should be self-consistent, which is what I would expect of a chatbot that "reasons". OK, should be. Are we, though? I can recall an American president who could not even complete two sentences without a direct contradiction. And if we think about how billions of people claim to base their lives in self contradicting fictitious books, maybe we are not such a self consistent species after all. Self consistency is not a great criterion for reasoning. If I tell you "because Jesus told me so" after every question, that's consistent but not interesting. It would be trivial to emulate consistency, in fact. I think we are all talking past each other because everyone had a different definition of reasoning. My main point - which I have hopefully consistently presented! - is that we don't really know how humans reason, so we should not focus on categorical statements about it at all.

by epups 3y ago

AstralStorm 3y ago

If so, then why ChatGPT gets stuck in a loop of producing the same wrong answers? And sometimes repeatedly producing new wrong ones? Does it immediately forget the context? It is being told how it is wrong and where in no uncertain terms. Yet it goes back to the same mistake, or skips steps for its reasoning convenience.

DonaldPShimoda 3y ago

> Well then I guess all the humans in this thread would come to the exact same conclusion, because according to some expectations we are perfectly consistent and capable of logical reasoning. You've missed the point (hopefully not intentionally). Neither I nor anybody else suggested that all humans must arrive at identical conclusions as one another for the process to be considered "reasoning". But any individual human should be self-consistent, which is what I would expect of a chatbot that "reasons". Because, allegedly, the bot keeps all of the prompts in the same context, suggesting a single continuous conversation with one "entity" rather than treating each response as a separate instance. So when the chatbot suddenly cannot back up its own prior conclusion, it's demonstrating a lack of self-consistency, which shows that it is not "reasoning" for any typical definition of the term. It has no self-awareness (nor can it, though AI proponents seem to claim otherwise).

epups 3y ago
> But any individual human should be self-consistent, which is what I would expect of a chatbot that "reasons". OK, should be. Are we, though? I can recall an American president who could not even complete two sentences without a direct contradiction. And if we think about how billions of people claim to base their lives in self contradicting fictitious books, maybe we are not such a self consistent species after all. Self consistency is not a great criterion for reasoning. If I tell you "because Jesus told me so" after every question, that's consistent but not interesting. It would be trivial to emulate consistency, in fact. I think we are all talking past each other because everyone had a different definition of reasoning. My main point - which I have hopefully consistently presented! - is that we don't really know how humans reason, so we should not focus on categorical statements about it at all.