ontolog-forum
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: [ontolog-forum] A No-Go Result For Human-Level Machine Intelligence‏

To: "[ontolog-forum]" <ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
From: Steven Ericsson-Zenith <steven@xxxxxxx>
Date: Sun, 4 Jan 2015 12:17:22 -0800
Message-id: <CAAyxA7sqPQE1OL1G4if3dd+dx9Oy_zodfM36-Kt+5w9pp3y1ug@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Indeed John, 

Instinct is critical and in the context of my work finding the structure that is behind these instinctual devices is essential. However, my intuition says it is not merely in the brain. It is not merely "the game" or the form of the "mental agent." The physical ability to stand at a sink with dexterous arms and hands counts for something. Implanting the cognitive structure for dish washing, for example, into a bird or a beaver will not get your dishes washed. 

I assume that this is what you meant by "the wrong tools."

Regards,
Steven



On Sun, Jan 4, 2015 at 8:52 AM, John F Sowa <sowa@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Steven and Rich,

The following comment by Steven may sound perverse to Rich,
but it raises some important questions:

> As I read this, BTW, it appears to suggest that birds can wash dishes
> wash dishes or that one may simply train a beaver.

Three points:

  1. Birds can't wash dishes the same way that humans do for the same
     reason why humans can't wash dishes with a sewing machine -- they
     have the wrong tools.

  2. Beavers are born with an instinct to build dams, birds are born
     with an instinct to build nests, and humans are born with an
     instinct to speak a language.  Each species has built-in tools
     that are very well adapted for those activities.

  3. But to build a good nest, dam, or sentence, they need to learn
     from their parents how to use those tools, and they need a large
     amount of creativity to discover all the required details.

> Your animal case is no different from the human case, so I find it
> hard to justify that it is "more critical" - from my point of view
> it is the same problem.

I certainly agree that it's the same problem.  Learning to build
a nest, a dam, or a sentence involves the same kinds of neural
mechanisms *and* the same kind of learning and creativity.

If Chomsky were a beaver, he would claim that the "poverty of the
stimulus" problem requires a built-in procedure for dam building.
But instinct and built-in tools plus an appropriate environment,
learning from parents, and childhood creativity are sufficient.

To emphasize these points, I added slide 16 (copy below) to
http://www.jfsowa.com/talks/micai.pdf

John
___________________________________________________________________

Slide 16 of http://www.jfsowa.com/talks/micai.pdf

                      MAKING AND USING TOOLS

The ability to make tools is a critical sign of intelligence:
* All animals, including humans, are born with a set of built-in tools.
* Birds can’t wash dishes for the same reason that humans can’t wash
   dishes with a sewing machine:  they have the wrong tools.
* Humans make and use the most elaborate tools, but biologists keep
   discovering more species that make and use tools.

The role of instinct:
* Birds have an instinct to build nests, beavers have an instinct
   to build dams, and humans have an instinct to speak a language.
* But the details of the nests, dams, and languages depend on the
   animals’ built-in tools, the environment, learning from parents,
   and creativity.

For every physical tool or activity, there is a kind of mental tool:
* Minsky’s mental agents correspond to the diversity of human
   activities.
* The diversity of Wittgenstein’s language games results from the many
   ways of using the human vocal tools for talking about the activities.


_________________________________________________________________
Message Archives: http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontolog-forum/  
Config Subscr: http://ontolog.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontolog-forum/  
Unsubscribe: mailto:ontolog-forum-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Shared Files: http://ontolog.cim3.net/file/
Community Wiki: http://ontolog.cim3.net/wiki/ 
To join: http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?WikiHomePage#nid1J    (01)

<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>