asciilifeform: creates a symbol with no meaning other than identity (cannot add, subtract it, it only has a name and the only permitted operation is determination of identity)
asciilifeform: ^ best representation of the concept i know of
asciilifeform: what 'ai and stupidity' was about, was an actual pestilence of pseudoscience, where folks convinced themselves and others that they were accomplishing 'great things' while really pulling each other's dicks in a most stultifying way
asciilifeform: we might be speaking of different things then, re: 'names'
asciilifeform: the one where not a single thing about the circuit made sense to the human dissector
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: remember the self-evolving fpga?
asciilifeform: say, if it was able to distinguish cat from dog, and now operates an automated dogcatcher, prior to the renaming of strings, and still can - there was 'substance.'
asciilifeform: the idea in the article can (and has) been rephrased like this. if you remove all the 'suggestively-named strings' like 'understand' - and replace with 'gensyms' - e.g., 100324 - does the resulting machine still do or even appear to do anything of interest?☟︎☟︎
asciilifeform: brain is logic machine like brick is flying machine.
asciilifeform: and today perhaps the allmighty favours ohm's law, tomorrow - not
asciilifeform: afaik western traditions of sophistry are not even the most die-hard adherents of this idea. in some variants of islam, they actually believe that 'if the circuit works, it was will of allah' and nothing more
asciilifeform: who would even dare to ask about sciences.
asciilifeform: even the elixir of distinguishing cat from dog by mechanical means, so far escapes programmers.
asciilifeform: and i'm not altogether certain that i'd profit from grasping it
asciilifeform: the principle involved, i must confess, escapes me
asciilifeform is firmly persuaded that every microscope is a hammer. however, not every hammer is a microscope, demonstrably. and therein lies the boojum.
asciilifeform: wide net, but somewhere in it there flops a fish, 'understanding'
asciilifeform: well, if i had to give an example of 'understanding', involving 'transformation', i'd offer the transformation of pebbles on a beach (original 'calculation') into well, calculation, and mathematics, and, ..., nukes.
asciilifeform must confess he is rather puzzled at this point
asciilifeform: he is thinking of another variety of clever tricks.
asciilifeform: (not related to above, but a contemporary)
asciilifeform: weizenbaum, author of iconic 'eliza', also understood how little a mechanism really needs to 'understand' in order to give an idiot the illusion of 'understanding.'
asciilifeform: d a lot of people, most prominently himself, and enrage a lot of others.'
asciilifeform: 'programs to a great degree are problems rather than solutions. If a researcher tries to write an "understanding" program, it isn't because he has thought of a better way of implementing this well-understood task, but because he thinks he can come closer to writing the implementation. If he calls the main loop of his program "UNDERSTAND ', he is (until proven innocent) merely begging the question. He may mislea
asciilifeform: it's an epic paper, that not merely rained but pissed on the exuberant 'ai' parade of the '70s academe.
asciilifeform: but is an iconic cult-classic (mcdermott, 1976)
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: jeffidiocy << there we go. herr lightoller's, too.
asciilifeform: likely - we will get to watch (or, feel on skin...) all of the available mechanisms.
asciilifeform has no data on the present state of the btc musical chairs landscape and cannot say
asciilifeform: if only winblows were confined to some magical reddit kingdom, where all stupid folks live.
asciilifeform: while lies, of the 'false flag' variety, may not be the only tool in the buggers' toolbox - it is certainly their favourite. and perhaps the sharpest.
asciilifeform: with the inevitable shitgnome 'fixes' brought out
asciilifeform: i predict that when the hunter 'shoots', it will be 'spun' to look like a 'protocol' (or even crypto) break, of one kind or another
asciilifeform: inching closer, wants to bag more than one.
asciilifeform: i inevitably picture a hunter, trying to avoid 'spooking' the birds
