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Searle's arguments aren't that broad. If you're thinking of the Chinese Room, the point there is simply that computation isn't understanding. It's not a claim t

Searle's arguments aren't that broad. If you're thinking of the Chinese Room, the point there is simply that computation isn't understanding. It's not a claim that AGI is nonsense in principle, and in fact most of these older arguments are narrowly scoped to GOFAI. Of course nobody serious thinks LLMs have minds, either, but unless you believe in ghosts it's hard to make a case that human-like AGI shouldn't ultimately be possible.

digging 2y ago
> unless you believe in ghosts it's hard to make a case that human-like AGI shouldn't ultimately be possible. Thanks for chiming in as I'm completely unfamiliar with Searle. I don't believe in immaterial human souls, therefore self-aware AGI appears to be a near inevitability of technological advancement from my perspective. To suggest that it's impossible is, in my opinion, absurd.
dvt 2y ago
> unless you believe in ghosts it's hard to make a case that human-like AGI shouldn't ultimately be possible The argument that any non-materialist position (panpsychism, substance dualism, monadism, etc.) must "believe in ghosts" is comically reductive. Metaphysics is a thing, you know. So is moral philosophy. I mean, heck, so is logic. In all these subfields, arguing that their respective first principles are purely materialist is an uphill battle. I get a feeling that post-2000s materialism is basically logical positivism 2.0 (and we know how that ended). > It's not a claim that AGI is nonsense in principle You're playing a semantic game here; but in any case, understanding is a function of intelligence, so (working backwards), you're actually shooting yourself in the foot, anyway.
- FreakLegion 2y ago
  > The argument that any non-materialist position (panpsychism, substance dualism, monadism, etc.) must "believe in ghosts" is comically reductive. "Ghost in the machine" is from Ryle. It's quite apropos here. > You're playing a semantic game here; but in any case, understanding is a function of intelligence, so (working backwards), you're actually shooting yourself in the foot, anyway. I honestly don't know what point you're trying to make. To recap, you said that: 1. You don't believe in this AGI nonsense. 2. Searle elaborated on why AGI is nonsense in the 80s. And I am clarifying for you that: 1. Searle did not elaborate on why AGI is nonsense in the 80s. He doesn't claim that AGI is nonsense at all. 2. His arguments are specific to the methods that were called AI, and a bunch of technical and philosophical claims about those methods and about the human mind, at the time he was writing. Ditto for Dreyfus. What you can get Searle to commit to is the idea that human-like AGI can't be a program executed on computers as we think of them today. He's an ultra-materialist, like Ryle, and thinks the physical reality of brains is essential to the minds they produce. To make a mind, you need to make a brain. (In other words, he thinks "Lena" is nonsense: https://qntm.org/mmacevedo https://qntm.org/mmacevedo.) So he would say that ChatGPT is no closer to being human-like AGI than ELIZA was, since it's no closer to having something like a human brain, and if all you meant by "the whole AGI nonsense" is that ChatGPT isn't a step toward human-like AGI, then he'd agree. But he wouldn't say that human-like AGI itself is nonsense, precisely because he doesn't believe in ghosts.
  - dvt 2y ago
    Just to clarify, I disagree that materialism is the one true way (re: your "believe in ghosts" quip), even though I'm quite aware that Searle is not a cartesian dualist (which is why I made the comment about what our "brains do"). Philosophy of mind-wise, I'm much more in line with folks like Chalmers, though not fully bought in there, either. And yes, by "AGI nonsense" I meant that "ChatGPT isn't a step toward human-like AGI" since the main chatter these days is about how ChatGPT/Claude/etc. is the harbinger of AGI. I think Searle's argument is particularly strong because you don't even have to believe in something "spooky" happening in our heads. In fact, I'd probably extend "AGI nonsense" to "AGI is flat out not possible" but that's more of a hunch and the full argument invokes things like the non-computability of various physical phenomena.

digging 2y ago

> unless you believe in ghosts it's hard to make a case that human-like AGI shouldn't ultimately be possible. Thanks for chiming in as I'm completely unfamiliar with Searle. I don't believe in immaterial human souls, therefore self-aware AGI appears to be a near inevitability of technological advancement from my perspective. To suggest that it's impossible is, in my opinion, absurd.

dvt 2y ago

> unless you believe in ghosts it's hard to make a case that human-like AGI shouldn't ultimately be possible The argument that any non-materialist position (panpsychism, substance dualism, monadism, etc.) must "believe in ghosts" is comically reductive. Metaphysics is a thing, you know. So is moral philosophy. I mean, heck, so is logic. In all these subfields, arguing that their respective first principles are purely materialist is an uphill battle. I get a feeling that post-2000s materialism is basically logical positivism 2.0 (and we know how that ended). > It's not a claim that AGI is nonsense in principle You're playing a semantic game here; but in any case, understanding is a function of intelligence, so (working backwards), you're actually shooting yourself in the foot, anyway.

FreakLegion 2y ago
> The argument that any non-materialist position (panpsychism, substance dualism, monadism, etc.) must "believe in ghosts" is comically reductive. "Ghost in the machine" is from Ryle. It's quite apropos here. > You're playing a semantic game here; but in any case, understanding is a function of intelligence, so (working backwards), you're actually shooting yourself in the foot, anyway. I honestly don't know what point you're trying to make. To recap, you said that: 1. You don't believe in this AGI nonsense. 2. Searle elaborated on why AGI is nonsense in the 80s. And I am clarifying for you that: 1. Searle did not elaborate on why AGI is nonsense in the 80s. He doesn't claim that AGI is nonsense at all. 2. His arguments are specific to the methods that were called AI, and a bunch of technical and philosophical claims about those methods and about the human mind, at the time he was writing. Ditto for Dreyfus. What you can get Searle to commit to is the idea that human-like AGI can't be a program executed on computers as we think of them today. He's an ultra-materialist, like Ryle, and thinks the physical reality of brains is essential to the minds they produce. To make a mind, you need to make a brain. (In other words, he thinks "Lena" is nonsense: https://qntm.org/mmacevedo https://qntm.org/mmacevedo.) So he would say that ChatGPT is no closer to being human-like AGI than ELIZA was, since it's no closer to having something like a human brain, and if all you meant by "the whole AGI nonsense" is that ChatGPT isn't a step toward human-like AGI, then he'd agree. But he wouldn't say that human-like AGI itself is nonsense, precisely because he doesn't believe in ghosts.
- dvt 2y ago
  Just to clarify, I disagree that materialism is the one true way (re: your "believe in ghosts" quip), even though I'm quite aware that Searle is not a cartesian dualist (which is why I made the comment about what our "brains do"). Philosophy of mind-wise, I'm much more in line with folks like Chalmers, though not fully bought in there, either. And yes, by "AGI nonsense" I meant that "ChatGPT isn't a step toward human-like AGI" since the main chatter these days is about how ChatGPT/Claude/etc. is the harbinger of AGI. I think Searle's argument is particularly strong because you don't even have to believe in something "spooky" happening in our heads. In fact, I'd probably extend "AGI nonsense" to "AGI is flat out not possible" but that's more of a hunch and the full argument invokes things like the non-computability of various physical phenomena.