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Along these lines, Gary Marcus said that "you can't build a ladder to the moon" [1]. In other words, neural nets do well on simple things, but general intellige

Along these lines, Gary Marcus said that "you can't build a ladder to the moon" [1]. In other words, neural nets do well on simple things, but general intelligence is such a high bar that neural nets (and statistical methods in general) can never reach it, without the addition of the sort of secret sauce that allows humans to really make sense of the world. I used to be sympathetic to this viewpoint. But these days I'm more and more willing to believe that we can actually build a ladder to the moon. [1] https://www.quantamagazine.org/common-sense-comes-closer-to-computers-20200430/ https://www.quantamagazine.org/common-sense-comes-closer-to-...

ren_engineer 3y ago
I mean even Gary Marcus is now an AI doomer who went from mocking these models to saying they need to be banned or research slowed for safety reasons. Why's he so scared of a ladder? A lot of people having to eat crow due to how quickly things changed in just a few years
MichaelZuo 3y ago
> Gary Marcus said that "you can't build a ladder to the moon" [1]. It is physically possible to build a ladder all the way to the Moon. A structure made out of close-to-ideal carbon nanotubes would have sufficient strength. It would just require an unbelievable complex carbon nanotube 'weaving' system that can somehow operate and move directly between the Earth and Moon. Which is quite an interesting parallel to the complexity of the human brain when I think about the analogy.
- HPsquared 3y ago
  How would it behave with the relative movement and rotation of the moon/earth? Would it maintain a stable position? I imagine it would wrap around the earth if it was fixed to the surface. But if it's free floating, wouldn't it want to fall one way or the other? Or spin somehow? EDIT: this would be a good one for Randall Munroe's "What If" EDIT EDIT: of course: https://what-if.xkcd.com/157/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/157/
  - cyanydeez 3y ago
    there's no material stuff enough. it'd basically go logarithmic, eventually parallel to rotation.
unraveller 3y ago
I've heard it said better as "climbing a tree is not progress towards reaching the moon" except in the inspirational sense. Though after seeing the decades of hand coding that goes into a search engine it kinda proves moon ladders are very useful however incomplete.

ren_engineer 3y ago

I mean even Gary Marcus is now an AI doomer who went from mocking these models to saying they need to be banned or research slowed for safety reasons. Why's he so scared of a ladder? A lot of people having to eat crow due to how quickly things changed in just a few years

MichaelZuo 3y ago

> Gary Marcus said that "you can't build a ladder to the moon" [1]. It is physically possible to build a ladder all the way to the Moon. A structure made out of close-to-ideal carbon nanotubes would have sufficient strength. It would just require an unbelievable complex carbon nanotube 'weaving' system that can somehow operate and move directly between the Earth and Moon. Which is quite an interesting parallel to the complexity of the human brain when I think about the analogy.

HPsquared 3y ago
How would it behave with the relative movement and rotation of the moon/earth? Would it maintain a stable position? I imagine it would wrap around the earth if it was fixed to the surface. But if it's free floating, wouldn't it want to fall one way or the other? Or spin somehow? EDIT: this would be a good one for Randall Munroe's "What If" EDIT EDIT: of course: https://what-if.xkcd.com/157/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/157/
- cyanydeez 3y ago
  there's no material stuff enough. it'd basically go logarithmic, eventually parallel to rotation.

unraveller 3y ago

I've heard it said better as "climbing a tree is not progress towards reaching the moon" except in the inspirational sense. Though after seeing the decades of hand coding that goes into a search engine it kinda proves moon ladders are very useful however incomplete.