Re: The problem of intelligence.

On Sat, 07 Jan 2006 00:40:25 GMT, Risujin <risujin@xxxxxxxxxxx> in
comp.ai.philosophy wrote:

>Lester Zick wrote:
>>>You keep mentioning the "paradox of intelligence". What exactly are you
>>>talking about? Where is the paradox?
>>
>> Nothing special about the term. We might say "puzzle" instead of
>> "paradox". I think the reason I used "paradox" is that no one seems
>> able to say exactly what "intelligence" means except metaphorically.
>
>A paradox is not only a puzzle but a seemingly contradictory one. I
>suppose we can brainstorm a few ways intelligence fits in there but lets
>just call it a problem and move on. :)

No problem. I think the "contradictory" aspect I referred to was that
a tangible such as the brain produces intangible mental effects such
as the mind. That's what I see as paradoxical. It's curious to me that
we don't see our brains in action; what we "see" are various mental
effects or images produced by our brains. Those mental effects are
what most people refer to as intangibles because we can't find the
images in the brain. So if the brain is tangible then the imaging of
tangibles must be intangible. That's what I mean by intelligence and
to me that's a first class paradox.

>>>What do you mean by concrete here? Are you asking whether or not we can
>>>measure intelligence?
>>
>> No. I'm asking what you and others mean by intelligence in mechanical
>> terms? You used "concrete" to specify a gauge for progress in solving
>> the problem of intelligence. So what do you mean by "concrete"? If you
>> mean something like an arbitrary gauge of whatever you take to measure
>> intelligence then I'd have to ask whether that "concrete" gauge really
>> measures intelligence in mechanical terms?
>
>I don't think you would disagree that a "concrete" definition of
>intelligence (more on that later), capable of being used as a progress
>meter, would be very important. But we need to address the philosophical
>side of things first.

Well I agree except the problem is scientific not philosophical. We
have a well defined problem: tangibles produced by an intangible
intelligence mechanized by a tangible brain. We know the images of
tangibles produced by a tangible brain are "out there". We just can't
find them "in here" in the brain. So we have to explain the transition
in mechanical terms. Philosophers have had their go at it to no avail.
It's a problem in mechanics not philosophy.

>> Well I consider your original argument against "we'll know it when
>> we see it" techniques for assessing artificial intelligence perfectly
>> valid. And I am definitely not categorically opposed to defining
>> intelligence. But I'm definitely categorically opposed to defining
>> intelligence anyway we want just so we can get on with mechanizing
>> the definition without actually defining the mechanics of intelligence
>> just so we can say we've made progress on some arbitrary definition.
>
>Granted the approach of the field of AI has been something to this
>effect with no relevant results.

When I use the term "definition" with respect to intelligence I'm
referring to a description of the mechanics of intelligence and not
something pulled out of thin air just because we can measure it.

>>>Do you actually know what a paradox is?
>>
>> Well I'm not stuck on the term. If you want to call it a puzzle
>> instead go ahead. It's still an unkown in mechanical terms and it
>> seems to produce certain paradoxical effects such as the mind and
>> mental effects not generally evident in material interactions.
>
>We can't sense these effects, but then again with our technology its
>like trying to feel an ant with a hammer. I wouldn't say that they are
>"unsensable" though.

Well this is the paradox. If we had any plausible prospect of ever
seeing tangibles in the brain I might agree that what's involved is
merely a refinement of technique. But I don't see evidence of that.
There are definitely tangibles we see "out there" and we see them
through operations of a tangible brain. And yet we can't find any
tangibles corresponding to those sights in the brain. There is some
hope of finding corresponding tangible neurological processes and
states but not of finding little tangible images in the brain of what
is seen by the brain. So I doubt we see the problem of intelligence
itself, whatever it may be, in correct mechanical perspective.

>> Sure but the question here is why exactly you expect intelligence to
>> be tangible if it produces intangible effects such as the mind and
>> mental effects? So either you're stuck trying to substitute tangible
>> effects for intelligence so you can measure them or you have to
>> explain how it is that intelligence is mechanical yet intangible. I
>> thought your original objection was that simply saying "we'll know
>> it when we see it" was unsatisfactory because we don't know what
>> we're looking at in mechanical terms. But adding further tangible
>> qualifications to a tangible "we'll know it when we seet it" doesn't
>> make the effect itself or it's explanation tangible.
>
>The original objection says we can't "know it when we see it" unless we
>have some mechanical means of judging. I think our problem needs more
>definition.

Yes but the issue is whether we merely need a refinement of definition
within existing technique or whether our mechanical perspective is
incorrect to begin with. Sure we need more and better definition but
the whole problem of tangible --> intangible doesn't go away as long
as we're only prepared to define the problem of intelligence in terms
of tangibles.

>> I suppose I read your original objection as opposed to tangibility for
>> intelligence. So I have to ask whether you would expect to be able to
>> "see" intelligence at all and if so in what terms?It's one thing to be
>> able "see" various behavioral, neural, and skilled tangible effects of
>> intelligence without being able to "see" the thing itself in tangible
>> terms. So if you don't expect to be able to "see" intelligence in such
>> tangible terms then all you can really expect to be able to do is list
>> a whole slew of intelligent effects and mechanize them artificially.
>
>I never meant to say intelligence is intangible.

Yes but I do. I don't see any apparent resolution to the problem of
intelligence in terms of tangible --> intangible strictly in terms of
tangibles alone. So unless you're prepared to "see" intelligence in
some tangible I doubt you can approach the problem successfully
in terms of tangibles without resort to some intangible mechanics.

>> Well if your point is that intelligence in itself is a tangible thing
>> then I can see that the more the better as far as measurement is
>> concerned. What I don't see is how or whether tangible measures
>> can have any bearing if intelligence is mechanically intangible. I
>> doubt very much that intelligence itself is a tangible thing even
>> though it produces tangible effects. But simply substituting tangible
>> things for intelligence simply because they're measurable doesn't
>> have any bearing on whether or not intelligence is tangible. Nor
>> would it have any bearing on figuring out what intelligence is if it
>> is intangible. And that is the fundamental issue requiring a solution
>> before intelligence can be mechanized artificially or otherwise.
>
>I think we need to take a stab at putting more definition on our
>problem. I mean, what are we looking for really? What sort of product
>would satisfy our goals?

I agree. The difficulty is you and historically everyone else has
demanded a tangible solution to intangible intelligent effects
without being able to explain the transition. It's known as the
mind/body dichotomy in the literature. Once that transition is
identified mechanically the whole problem of intelligence vanishes
and technology takes over because we'll know what we're looking for
and what we're looking at.

>* First and foremost, we are looking for an algorithm. We want this
>algorithm to run on a computer and exhibit certain properties.

Okay.

>* There may not be a single answer. There are likely many ways in which
>our constraints can be satisfied. There is no one "intelligence", what
>we are seeking may one of many different ways of doing the same thing.
>It is common in Computer Science to see completely different algorithms
>do the same thing optimally.

I disagree. If we're looking for intelligence we need to find it first
and then contemplate what intelligence can do artificially.

>* Our answer may not approximate human intelligence. The perennial
>example here is the bird and the airplane. Both fly, but which one makes
>more sense for us to use for human flight? It is likely that a top-down
>approach, working backwards from criteria, is the best way to approach
>the problem. Reverse-engineering the human brain is not practical today.

I agree.

>* Our answer is not the silver bullet. Humans are capable of a great
>variety of skills and tasks, but we should not be overly optimistic with
>our goals. What we create may only be capable of intelligence within a
>limited domain. We are looking for generality, but we should not expect
>to find it right away.

Well here you're making conflicting assumptions: one, that we
approach the problem top-down and, two, there is no silver bullet.
If there is no silver bullet there is no top-down. As far as I can see
top-down requires a starting place in mechanical terms and that
implies some kind of silver bullet which I would characterize as a
tangible-intangible transition mechanics.

>* To define what properties we want to have, we need to pick the
>smallest set of traits with which we will be satisfied. There are many
>superfluous requirements that get placed on the problem. Ones such as
>"it must be reproducible in neurons", "it must be scalable", or "it must
>be built out of elements x, y, and z". If we heap on too many demands we
>will never find a solution, but then again, if we require too few we
>will not find an acceptable answer.
>
>We can make all of these points without even touching on a definition
>for intelligence. But if we want to go further, we need to look at the
>defining traits of intelligence. What would we require? What qualities
>are we looking for?

Well as far as I can tell the only defining trait for intelligence is
a tangible-intangible transition mechanics. Without that all you're
ever going to see are intelligent effects and not intelligence.

>* Agency. Intelligence is a quality that pertains to an agent. Agency
>requires that there exist input signals from and output signals to an
>environment. These signals need to be sufficient for whatever task we
>want to accomplish.
>
>* Cognition. The agent should be capable of...
> ...accepting an arbitrary goal within the environment.
> ...accepting relevant information about its environment.
> ...planning actions that would lead to a more favorable position.
> ...creating sub-goals and plans for investigating them.
> ...abstracting, generalizing, and classifying information.
> ...generating relevant information from basic environmental inputs.
> ...reasoning about the environment from known information.
>
>Most of these requirements are about mental effects. If we look at each
>item individually it is not impossible to think of algorithms that could
>do this.

Definitely. Historically though the issue has not been the automation
of intelligent effects but artificial mechanization of intelligence
per se. We have all kinds of machines to automate effects but not to
automate the basic mechanism mainly because we don't know what it is.

>Another point is the importance of the environment. We can't define
>intelligence without referring repeatedly to the environment. What is
>intelligent in one set of circumstances may not be in another. Is it
>possible that a human could be placed in a set of conditions under which
>we would cease to be intelligent? If not, can we remove environmental
>restrictions from our definition?
>
>This is a mechanical definition of the problem. Although it is still
>"we'll know it when ..." it can be satisfied, and it is also possible to
>look at the items individually and partially qualify a solution.
>
>Is this an adequate definition of the problem?

Well the approach you lay out here is a lot more reasonable than most.
But the key to the problem is still the tangible-intangible mechanics.
With that the whole problem falls into easy perspective but without it
there is no resolution. It's easy to make facile assumptions regarding
intelligence and a variety of sentient effects such like awareness,
consciousness, etc. and "solve" the problem that way. People around
here do it all the time. They just naively assume everything from
electrons on up are conscious without saying what they're conscious of
or how. Consciousness then magically becomes "scalable" even though
no one can quite say what the mechanics of the scale are, whether the
scale has a calculus, or even what various things are conscious of.
That isn't science; it's childish wish fulfillment.

~v~~

.

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