The Gaia hypothesis started out as science, then discovered weed. But a digital Gaia movement for the 21st century will not, one suspects, be hippies. Maybe not as nice.
Artificial Intelligence
Logic & First Principles, 22: Is there room for fresh (hylemorphically shaped?) thinking on minds, souls and bodies?
In recent weeks, UD has been looking at the logic of being of minded intelligence, especially, embodied intelligence. One of the pivotal insights is outlined by Victor Reppert — pardon a bit of review: . . . let us suppose that brain state A [–> notice, state of a wetware, electrochemically operated computational substrate], which […]
New robotic device is controlled only by thought, no brain implant
If the mind is an illusion, how can it act directly on external things, by the force of decision-making alone?
Robert J. Marks: Simple sentences confuse AI
Fun with the grammar we take for granted: Groucho Marx (1890–1977) used to start one of his quips with “I once shot an elephant in my pajamas.” That seems clear enough but then he follows up with “How he got into my pajamas I’ll never know.” The punch line depends on the ambiguity of the […]
If Shakespeare is right about imagination, robot Sophia will certainly break some hearts
And they could be turned on and off. What are the implications of that?
Jonathan Bartlett: The key to machine learning is not machines but mathematics
People forget that finger counting is machine learning too. (as far as your mind is concerned, your fingers are machines.)
Machines won’t think like people—how do we deal with the disappointment?
Jonathan Bartlett (our johnnyb) offers some thoughts on a new model of machine intelligence
Eric Holloway: With infinite data, AI would not outperform a human with finite data
Because the halting problem is undecideable
Brendan Dixon: You are the ghost in the machine that powers AI
The machine can’t be smarter than you because you program it.
Key Silicon Valley figures hope to beat death the transhumanist way
You, by the way, are doomed: Everything has a history, including Silicon Valley. According to a new media theorist, Douglas Rushkoff, an influential Valley philosophy might underlie the current attitudes, values, and beliefs: “There is a Silicon Valley religion, and it’s one that doesn’t particularly care for people — at least not in our present […]
In 1973, a computer said the world would end in 2040
Jonathan Bartlett offers some thoughts on a frantic, bizarre – but instructive – computer-driven prediction.
Logic & First Principles, 21: Insightful intelligence vs. computationalism
One of the challenges of our day is the commonplace reduction of intelligent, insightful action to computation on a substrate. That’s not just Sci Fi, it is a challenge in the academy and on the street — especially as AI grabs more and more headlines. A good stimulus for thought is John Searle as he […]
AI and hopes for fusion power
A recent news item suggests that AI may help bring fusion power to the table on the long used but challenging Tokamak toroidal reactor architecture. This would be a major positive use of AI technology, if it proves sufficiently reliable: Artificial intelligence (AI), a branch of computer science that is transforming scientific inquiry and industry, […]
Robert J. Marks: What do AI and evolution have in common?
Many biologists claimed to have written code to simulate evolution. But the popularization of the No Free Lunch theorems showed that the computer programmer must infuse guiding information into the evolutionary program to make it work. To explain the diversity of creativity, an evolution process must be directed.
Why it’s hard to come up with a test for AI intelligence
Holloway: Intelligence, like randomness, is mathematically undefinable.