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> Well, if you give that line to a German who hasn't learned any English, the answer will also differ from what an educated English speaker will give you? What'

> Well, if you give that line to a German who hasn't learned any English, the answer will also differ from what an educated English speaker will give you? What's your point? Great observation. A German who does not speak English will likely understand the question is in a non-German language and proceed from there. Perhaps seeking a translation, perhaps replying that they do not speak English and so the question is nonsensical for them. My point is that the German has an understanding of this situation and will communicate accordingly. And, in this example, the LLM trained on Java source code does not have understanding, cannot have understanding, and will emit whatever its training data set directs it to do with the same confidence as any other answer to questions posed to it. Because LLM's are algorithms, quite lovely ones, and algorithms can simulate the effect of understanding, but cannot possess it. Because understanding of this sort is a property of a person. Or maybe a better way to state this is what people think of as understanding is what we know to be understanding, which is by definition the ability to understand perceptions we, as people, experience. > What's an original insight to you? I don't think the following insight is original, but I'll put it out there anyway: Understanding is a property of people for any definition of understanding a person is capable of having. This is due to the fact that understanding exists strictly within the consciousness of the entity defining/possessing it.

eru 2y ago
That seems weirdly restricted and circular. To illustrate: I can get drunk or fall asleep or get hit on the head, then I'm still a person, but I can't understand. You can get a hint of that, by trying to talk to me, and figuring out that I don't make much sense. Similarly, someone might figure out how to talk to dolphins or even aliens. If they give sufficiently sensible sensible replies, we will surely declare them to be sentient enough to 'understand'. Another example: we've exchanged a few messages here. You seem to be smart enough to understand some things, but I don't know whether you are just an exceptionally advanced LLM (and the same goes vice versa for your opinion of me). Yet, I make the judgement that you probably 'understand'. But that's purely based on observed interactions, I did not probe whether you are 'people'. Perhaps you (or me) are just simulating the effect of understanding? How would we be sure, if the simulation was good enough? We agree that contemporary LLMs ain't good enough to have a good 'simulation of understanding'. But once the simulation becomes good enough, I don't think it makes a difference whether it's 'just a simulation' or the real deal. (I don't know whether a straight-forward enlargement of contemporary LLMs will be good enough. But that's an empirical question to me, not a philosophical one. I suspect if you go insanely large with insane amounts of training, the architecture of contemporary LLMs might be enough; just from pure brute-force scale. But I also suspect that that in practice we will first find success with more economic use of resources via more interesting techniques.)

eru 2y ago

That seems weirdly restricted and circular. To illustrate: I can get drunk or fall asleep or get hit on the head, then I'm still a person, but I can't understand. You can get a hint of that, by trying to talk to me, and figuring out that I don't make much sense. Similarly, someone might figure out how to talk to dolphins or even aliens. If they give sufficiently sensible sensible replies, we will surely declare them to be sentient enough to 'understand'. Another example: we've exchanged a few messages here. You seem to be smart enough to understand some things, but I don't know whether you are just an exceptionally advanced LLM (and the same goes vice versa for your opinion of me). Yet, I make the judgement that you probably 'understand'. But that's purely based on observed interactions, I did not probe whether you are 'people'. Perhaps you (or me) are just simulating the effect of understanding? How would we be sure, if the simulation was good enough? We agree that contemporary LLMs ain't good enough to have a good 'simulation of understanding'. But once the simulation becomes good enough, I don't think it makes a difference whether it's 'just a simulation' or the real deal. (I don't know whether a straight-forward enlargement of contemporary LLMs will be good enough. But that's an empirical question to me, not a philosophical one. I suspect if you go insanely large with insane amounts of training, the architecture of contemporary LLMs might be enough; just from pure brute-force scale. But I also suspect that that in practice we will first find success with more economic use of resources via more interesting techniques.)