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- cross-posted to:
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We are constantly fed a version of AI that looks, sounds and acts suspiciously like us. It speaks in polished sentences, mimics emotions, expresses curiosity, claims to feel compassion, even dabbles in what it calls creativity.
But what we call AI today is nothing more than a statistical machine: a digital parrot regurgitating patterns mined from oceans of human data (the situation hasnāt changed much since it was discussed here five years ago). When it writes an answer to a question, it literally just guesses which letter and word will come next in a sequence ā based on the data itās been trained on.
This means AI has no understanding. No consciousness. No knowledge in any real, human sense. Just pure probability-driven, engineered brilliance ā nothing more, and nothing less.
So why is a real āthinkingā AI likely impossible? Because itās bodiless. It has no senses, no flesh, no nerves, no pain, no pleasure. It doesnāt hunger, desire or fear. And because there is no cognition ā not a shred ā thereās a fundamental gap between the data it consumes (data born out of human feelings and experience) and what it can do with them.
Philosopher David Chalmers calls the mysterious mechanism underlying the relationship between our physical body and consciousness the āhard problem of consciousnessā. Eminent scientists have recently hypothesised that consciousness actually emerges from the integration of internal, mental states with sensory representations (such as changes in heart rate, sweating and much more).
Given the paramount importance of the human senses and emotion for consciousness to āhappenā, there is a profound and probably irreconcilable disconnect between general AI, the machine, and consciousness, a human phenomenon.
Way to completely misrepresent what I was actually saying. Nowhere was I suggesting that there isnāt a huge difference between the two. What I pointed out is that, while undeniably more complex, our brains appear to work on similar principles.
My only point was that the feedback loop from embodiment creates the basis for volition, and that what we call intelligence is our ability to create internal models of the world that we use for decision making. So, this is likely a prerequisite for any artificial system that has any meaningful intelligence.
Maybe try engaging with that instead of writing a wall of text arguing with a straw man.
Sure in the same way that a horse and a motorcycle operate on similar principles and serve the same function.
Where the straw man? Youāve missed my point entirely. LLMs and the human mind operate on categorically different principles. All the verbiage used to describe neural network models has little to do with how the brain actually works. Thatās honestly wasnāt a problem until Tech companies started purposely misusing those terms and now far too many people seem to think āAIā is something itās not.
A bold statement given that we donāt actually understand how the brain operates exactly and what algorithms that would translate into.
The straw man is you continuing to argue against equating LLMs with the functioning of the brain, something I never said here.
You appear to be conflating the implementation details of how the brain works with the what itās doing in a semantic sense. There is zero evidence that all the complexity of the brain is inherent to the way our reasoning functions. Again, we donāt have a full understanding of how the brain accomplishes tasks like reasoning. It may be a lot more complex than what LLMs do, or it may not be. We do not know.
Finally, none of this has anything to do with the point I was actually making which is regarding embodiment. You decided to ignore that to focus on braying about tech companies and LLMs instead.
Iām not claiming you ever said they functioned exactly the same way. Im simply stating that youāre way off base when you claim that they appear to operate using the same principles or that all evidence suggests the human mind is nothing more than a probability machine. Thatās not a straw man. You literally said those things.
Youāre betraying your own ignorance about neuroscience. The complexity of the brain is absolutely linked with its ability to reason and we have plenty of evidence to show that. The evolutionary process does not just create needless complexity if there is a more efficient path.
This is such a silly statement especially when youāve been claiming that both the brain and AI appear to work using the same principles. If you truly believe the mind is such a mystery then stop making that claim.
I donāt really care about your arguments concerning embodiment because theyāre so beside the point when you just blowing right by the most basic principles of neuroscience.
I bring up tech companies because theyāve had a massively distorting effect on how many computer scientists think the world works. Youāre not immune to it either simply because youāre a critic of capitalism. A ruthless criticism of that exists includes the very researchers whose work youāre taking at face value.
I literally said these things, and you never gave any actual counter argument to either of them.
Youāre betraying your ignorance of how biology works and illustrating that you have absolutely no business debating this subject. Efficiency is not the primary fitness function for evolution, itās survivability. And that means having a lot of redundancy baked into the system. Hereās a concrete example for you of just how much of the brain isnāt actually essential for normal day to day function. https://www.rifters.com/crawl/?p=6116
Thereās nothing silly in stating that the underlying principles are similar, but we donāt understand a lot of the mechanics of the brain. If you truly canāt understand such basic things thereās little point trying to have a meaningful discussion.
Thatās literally the whole context for this thread, it just doesnāt fit with the straw man you want to argue about.
Whose work am I taking at face value specifically? Youāre just spewing nonsense here without engaging with anything Iām saying.
Have some humility and willingness to learn.
I didnāt say it was the primary function. I guess all that talk about straw men was just projection. You donāt trust me, fine. Then what about Darwin who literally said, āNatural selection is continually trying to economize every part of the organization.ā Now please go and read some introductory texts on biology before trying to explain to me why Darwin is wrong. Thereās so much going on when it comes to the thermodynamics of living systems and youāre clearly not ready to have a conversation about it.
Youāre baseless assuming that hydrocephalus causes the brain to lose a substantial amount of its complexity. Where is the evidence for that? In most of these cases it seems much of the outer layers of the cerebral cortex are in tact. Itās also really telling that your citationās first source is an article titled āIs Your Brain Really Necessaryā which is followed in the Journal by another article entitled āMath and Sex: Are Girls Born with Less Ability?ā. But hey neuroscience hasnāt really advanced at all since 1980 right? The brain is totally redundant right? Thereās no possible way a critical and discerning person such as yourself could have been taken in by junk science, right?!!
I took issue with specific statements you made that stand apart from the rest of your comment. Thatās not a straw man. Although honestly this is on me. What can I expect from someone who thinks LLMs and the Human Brain are operating on similar principles? Youāre so wound up in a pseudoscientific fiction thereās nothing I can do. You might as well start believing in the astrology, crystals, and energy healing. At least those interests will make you seem fun and quirky instead of just an over confident tech bro.
I have plenty of willingness to learn from people who have a clue on the subject.
You literally tried to argue that evolution doesnāt create complexity if thereās a more efficient path.th.
Again, youāre showing a superficial understanding of the subject here. Natural selection selects for overall fitness, and efficiency is only a small part of equation. For example, plants donāt use the most efficient wavelength for producing energy, they use the one thatās most reliably available. Similarly, living organisms have all kinds of redundancies that allow them to continue to function when theyāre damaged. Evolution optimizes for survival over efficiency.
Maybe read the actual paper linked there?
What I linked you is a case study of an actual living person who was missing large parts of their brain and had a relatively normal life. But hey why focus on the actual facts when you can just write more word salad right?
You took issue with made up straw man arguments that you yourself made and have fuck all with what I actually said. Then you proceeded to demonstrate that you donāt actually understand the subject youāre debating. You might as well start believing in the astrology, crystals, and energy healing. At least those interests will make you seem fun and quirky instead of just a sad debate bro.