Re: Re[2]: computer-go: Pattern matching

["Yonik Seeley" <yonik@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message -----
From: <rbrown@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <computer-go@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, November 11, 1999 2:33 PM
Subject: Re[2]: computer-go: Pattern matching


> David Elsdon asserted:
>
> "There is no inherent difference between the human brain and a computer
system
> which prevents knowledge that it [sic] stored in a human brain from being
> emulated by a computer."
>
> This is a _very_ strong assertion.  I think it can easily be disproved.

If it is easily disproved, how about doing so?

>
> It may be the case that knowledge like office skills and perhaps even go
skills
> may be so emulated.  It may be the case that computers can write sonatas
in the
> style of Bach, or play games of go in the style of Takemiya, or of Go
Seigen.

Think about emulation at a lower layer... our whole brain can be
theoretically emulated.  For this reason any reasoning that a brain could
do, a computer could do.
The only thing that can put a monkey wrench in the works is if one believes
that there is an essence or soul that does not abide by physical laws and
thus can not be emulated.  I personally see no evidence for such a thing,
therefore I believe that theoretically anything a human can do, a computer
can do.

>
> I'm not disputing that, and maybe a computer will some day beat a 9-dan
pro, or
> compose Beethoven's 783rd Symphony.
>
> However, I _know_ what a rose smells like.  I _know_ when I am hungry.  If
you
> can prove to me that such knowledge, stored in my brain, may be emulated
by a
> computer, I will agree with your assertion.  Until then, I will continue
to
> believe that there _is_ an inherent difference between the human brain and
a
> computer system.  That inherent difference _does_ prevent the knowledge of
what
> a rose smells like, or the knowledge of what it is to be hungry, from
being
> stored in a computer.
>
> The Turing test is useless here, it's not enough for your program to type,
> "I'm hungry" even if it can fool me into thinking that it is a human.

But how do you know that fellow humans "feel" and are not just reporting?
That's why the Turing test exists... it is the only reasonable test of
artificial "human intelligence" that anyone has devised.

>
> As for what that difference is, it may simply be that we are made of meat
> instead of silicon, that our memories are stored electro-chemically as
RNA,
> instead of being stored upon coarser media.

Bingo, there you go.

>  So, all you have to do is build
> a meat computer, and re-try your assertion then.  Until then, such an
assertion
> about the capabilities of computers is at best wishful thinking.

No need to build a meat computer... they already exist!

-Yonik
 yseeley@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx