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Comment by johnaspden | Hacker News Reader

To save anyone else the trouble:

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The book’s core argument is that an artificial intelligence that could equal or exceed human intelligence—sometimes called artificial general intelligence (AGI)—is for mathematical reasons impossible. It offers two specific reasons for this claim:

    Human intelligence is a capability of a complex dynamic system—the human brain and central nervous system.

    Systems of this sort cannot be modelled mathematically in a way that allows them to operate inside a computer.

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If only the people building the AIs were this stupid!

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> Systems of this sort cannot be modelled mathematically

There's an amazing naive confidence required to say in absolute terms that something cannot be done. Essentially every great human achievement was considered impossible at one point.

“The growth of the Internet will slow drastically, as the flaw in ‘Metcalfe’s law’ becomes apparent: most people have nothing to say to each other! By 2005, it will become clear that the Internet’s impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine’s.” - Paul Krugman in 1998

Krugman was right that most people have nothing to say to each other. He just didn't realize that it wouldn't stop them from talking, incessantly.

"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible" -Lord Kelvin, 1895

To the defense of the authors that exact point is defended just after they expose their initial propositions. Their discussion is much deeper than what the comment above restricts it to.

> It offers two specific reasons for this claim:

I will be nitpicky here. They say they will offer two specific reasons. But they don't. They write one reason, which has two predicates. The two points make up together one reason. The two points are not reasons in themselves, only together do they form an argument.

Obviously this is not a substantial critique of their argument. But it is quite telling that even in their description, which should be the best edited and most polished part of their book, they write sloppy things like this.

They offer them in the book, the comment above is incomplete and erroneous.

I was not using the comment above.

Click on the link. See the section labeled "Book Description". The first paragraph following that label ends "It offers two specific reasons for this claim:"

And true enough there are two numbered point which follows. But they are not "two specific reasons". They are together one reason.

Let me illustrate what I mean by that:

Let's say I'm accused of being an axe murderer. In my defence I can offer the following argument:

1; i have proof that I was far away a few hours before the murder 2; the distance between where I was and where the murder happened is such that I couldn't possibly be there in time.

This is not two reason. This is a two sentence argument, and one reason. Let's see an example with two reasons:

1; I was far away from the crime scene, see proof... 2; I don't have arms, thus even if I were there I couldn't possibly wield an axe.

These are two separate reasons.

Why is this thing important? For two reasons:

Before I part with my money, and a substantial chunk of my free time, to read their argument I have to ascertain that they are worth this investment. To do this they have to signal in various ways that they are serious people and not bozos. Having impeccable book description would be in their favour in that department.

The second reason is even more important: If they truly would have two independent reasons to support their argument that would make it stronger. Even if they make some mistake in one, the other might still stand.

As it is now (based on the description and their first chapter exceprt) this is how their argument stands:

their thesis: artificial intelligence that could equal or exceed human intelligence is impossible.

1; The only way to engineer such technology is to create a software emulation of the human neurocognitive system.

2; To create a software emulation of the behaviour of a system we would need to create a mathematical model of this system that enables prediction of the system’s behaviour.

3; It is impossible to build mathematical models of this sort for complex systems.

These points form a chain. If any of these points is false, their argument fails. Thus they don't have two reasons, they only have one reason.

And I have serious doubts about every single of those statements alone. Which makes their arguments super shaky.

So it's not like mathematicians have ever tried to model complex dynamical systems? My entire PhD in complexity science and computational neuroscience must therefore be a joke, and the equations all figments of my imagination.

You should make your own opinion on the book, this exact point is discussed for a full chapter and they don't say such systems can't be modelled.

> Human intelligence is a capability of a complex dynamic system—the human brain and central nervous system.

Book author has apparently never walked around a Walmart at 11pm on Saturday. I'm pretty sure some general Python or shell scripts would win in intelligence.

10,000 years from now a supreme intelligence notes that superintelligence is a capability of complex dynamic system- the intergalactic metaswarm; and that systems of this sort cannot be modelled organically by biological processes in a way that allows them to operate within a skin sack of wet meat.

And yeah, like, that's obviously accurate.

Obligatory link to "They're Made out of Meat" https://www.mit.edu/people/dpolicar/writing/prose/text/think... (HN discussions https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24737993 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31965062 )

Are you flapping your meat as you write this?

there is a false equivalence here.

Not able to model != not able to implement.

Intelligence is situated, we may not be able to replicate human-like intelligence since it presupposes a human being, but it also doesn't mean we cannot come up with a different kind of intelligence which is functionally similar for e. flight.

(not rooting for AGI to happen anytime soon)

One could make the argument that it is impossible to build a human-level AI that uses less mass and less energy than a human brain. I don't see how you can make an argument that it is flatly impossible given larger mass and energy budgets.

Checkmate!, atheists.

Wow.

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