Free will sits among the most explored philosophical topics (among other giants like Ethics and Rationality), and for good reason, as it has seemingly direct consequences for the way we (choose to?) live our lives. The question has existed since ancient times, but recent scientific advances have added structure to the question, as we’ve discovered …
As researchers and philosophers discuss the path towards human-equivalent / superhuman general artificial intelligence, they frequently examine the concept of control. Control of our world has always been of central importance to our species, so it’s no surprise that we’d look to extend our control in the future. However, most of the currently discussed control …
I recently shared my last post on the Chinese room to Reddit, which led to some productive discussions in the comments. I thought it may be helpful to share some excerpts from one of those threads here, as it provides a slightly different way of thinking about the issue. Hope you find this discourse interesting …
The Chinese Room Argument is a thought experiment designed by John Searle to show why computers are not capable of consciousness or intentionality. For those unfamiliar, Searle’s concise version of the argument goes: “Imagine a native English speaker who knows no Chinese locked in a room full of boxes of Chinese symbols (a data base) …
We’ve now touched on the idea of general artificial intelligence (i.e. above human level) in a couple posts, and so it seemed time for a more thorough examination of how we might get there, and of what this type of “superintelligence” might look like. We’ll start out by taking a step back, and looking at …