>Equivalent statements could be made about how human brains are not magic, just biology - yet I think we still think.

They're not equivalent at all because the AI is by no means biological. "It's just maths" could maybe be applied to humans but this is backed entirely by supposition and would ultimately just be an assumption of its own conclusion - that human brains work on the same underlying principles as AI because it is assumed that they're based on the same underlying principles as AI.

▲

observationist 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

Unless you're supposing something mystical or supernatural about how brains work, then yes, it is "just" math, there is nothing else it could be. All of the evidence we have shows it's an electrochemical network of neurons processing information. There's no evidence that suggests anything different, or even the need for anything different. There's no missing piece or deep mystery to it.

It's on those who want alternative explanations to demonstrate even the slightest need for them exists - there is no scientific evidence that exists which suggests the operation of brains as computers, as information processors, as substrate independent equivalents to Turing machines, are insufficient to any of the cognitive phenomena known across the entire domain of human knowledge.

We are brains in bone vats, connected to a wonderful and sophisticated sensorimotor platform, and our brains create the reality we experience by processing sensor data and constructing a simulation which we perceive as subjective experience.

The explanation we have is sufficient to the phenomenon. There's no need or benefit for searching for unnecessarily complicated alternative interpretations.

If you aren't satisfied with the explanation, it doesn't really matter - to quote one of Neil DeGrasse Tyson's best turns of phrase: "the universe is under no obligation to make sense to you"

If you can find evidence, any evidence whatsoever, and that evidence withstands scientific scrutiny, and it demands more than the explanation we currently have, then by all means, chase it down and find out more about how cognition works and expand our understanding of the universe. It simply doesn't look like we need anything more, in principle, to fully explain the nature of biological intelligence, and consciousness, and how brains work.

Mind as interdimensional radios, mystical souls and spirits, quantum tubules, none of that stuff has any basis in a ruthlessly rational and scientific review of the science of cognition.

That doesn't preclude souls and supernatural appearing phenomena or all manner of "other" things happening. There's simply no need to tie it in with cognition - neurotransmitters, biological networks, electrical activity, that's all you need.

	▲	snickerbockers 3 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		>it doesn't really matter - to quote one of Neil DeGrasse Tyson's best turns of phrase: "the universe is under no obligation to make sense to you" Right back at you, brochacho. I'm not the one making a positive claim here. You're the one who insists that it must work in a specific way because you can't conceive of any alternatives. I have never seen ANY evidence or study linking any existent AI or computer system to human cognition. >There's no need or benefit for searching for unnecessarily complicated alternative interpretations. Thanks, if it's alright with you I might borrow this argument next time somebody tries to tell me the world isn't flat. >It simply doesn't look That's one of those phrases you use when you're REALLY confident that you know what you're talking about. > like we need anything more, in principle, to fully explain the nature of biological intelligence, and consciousness, and how brains work. Please fully explain the nature of intelligence, consciousness, and how brains work. >Mind as interdimensional radios, mystical souls and spirits, quantum tubules, none of that stuff has any basis in a ruthlessly rational and scientific review of the science of cognition. well i definitely never said anything even remotely similar to that. If i didn't know any better i might call this argument a "hallucination".
	▲	johnsmith1840 3 days ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		AI operates alot like trees do as they are both using maths under the hood. This is the point, we don't know the delta between brains and AI any assumption is equivalent to my statement.
	▲	jvanderbot 3 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Math is a superset of both processes (can model/implement both), but that doesn't imply that they are equivalent.

▲

hnfong 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Well, a better retort would be "Human brains are not magic, just physics. Protons, neutrons and electrons don't think".

But I think most people get what GP means.

▲

criddell 3 days ago | parent [-]

Until you can define what thinking is, you can't assert that particles don't think (panpsychism).

	▲	_alternator_ 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		Panpsychism is actually quite reasonable in part because it changes the questions you ask. Instead of “does it think” you need to ask “in what ways can it think, and in what ways is it constrained? What types of ‘experience/qualia’ can this system have, and what can’t it have?” When you think in these terms, it becomes clear that LLMs can’t have certain types of experiences (eg see in color) but could have others. A “weak” panpsychism approach would just stop at ruling out experience or qualia based on physical limitations. Yet I prefer the “strong” pansychist theory that whatever is not forbidden is required, which begins to get really interesting (would imply that for example an LLM actually experiences the interaction you have with it, in some way).

▲

pegasus 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

But parent didn't try to apply "it's just maths" to humans. He said one could just as easily say, as some do: "Humans are just biology, hence they're not magic". Our understanding of mathematics, including the maths of transformer models is limited, just as our understanding of biology. Some behaviors of these models have taken researches by surprise, and future surprises are not at all excluded. We don't know exactly how far they will evolve.

As for applying the word thinking to AI systems, it's already in common usage and this won't change. We don't have any other candidate words, and this one is the closest existing word for referencing a computational process which, one must admit, is in many ways (but definitely not in all ways) analogous to human thought.

▲

ikrenji 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Human brains might not be explained by the same type of math AI is explained with, but it will be some kind of math...

▲

Mehvix 3 days ago | parent [-]

There's no reason to believe this to be the case. Godel says otherwise.

▲

_alternator_ 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

Human brains and experiences seem to be constrained by the laws of quantum physics, which can be simulated to arbitrary fidelity on a computer. Nit sure where Godel’s incompleteness theory would even come in here…

▲

Mehvix 3 days ago | parent [-]

how are we going to deduce/measure/know the initialization and rules for consciousness? do you see any systems as not encodable/simulatable by quantum?

	▲	_alternator_ 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		I think you are asking whether consciousness might be a fundamentally different “thing” from physics and thus hard or impossible to simulate. I think there is abundant evidence that the answer is ‘no’. The main reason is that consciousness doesn’t give you new physics, it follows the same rules and restrictions. It seems to be “part of” the standard natural universe, not something distinct.

▲

squidbeak 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Brain damage? If thought was outside physics, it would be a bit more durable than Humpty Dumpty.

▲

gowld 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Please explain, because this interpetation of "Godel" is highly nonstandard.

▲

Mehvix 3 days ago | parent [-]

you may consider reading I am a strange loop for that, which can do far better justification than myself

if there's surely no algo to solve the halting problem, why would there be maths that describes consciousness?

▲

josh-sematic 3 days ago | parent [-]

Can you look at any arbitrary program and tell if it halts without running it indefinitely? If so, you should explain how and collect your Nobel. Telling everybody whether the Collatz conjecture is correct is a good warm up. If not, you can’t solve the halting program either. What does that have to do with consciousness though?

Having read “I Am a Strange Loop” I do not believe Hofstadter indicates that the existence of Gödel’s theorem precludes consciousness being realizable on a Turing machine. Rather if I recall correctly he points out that as a possible argument and then attempts to refute it.

On the other hand Penrose is a prominent believer that human’s ability to understand Gödel’s theorem indicates consciousness can’t be realized on a Turing machine but there’s far from universal agreement on that point.

	▲	Mehvix 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		per halting problem: any system capable of self reference has unprovable (un)truths, the system can not be complete and consistent. consciousness falls under this umbrella I'll try and ask OG q more clearly: why would the brain, consciousness, be formalizable? I think there's a yearn view nature as adhering to an underlying model, and a contrary view that consciousness is transcendental, and I lean towards the latter

▲

AlecSchueler 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> that human brains work on the same underlying principles as AI

That wasn't the assumption though, it was only that human brains work by some "non-magical" electro-chemical process which could be described as a mechanism, whether that mechanism followed the same principles of AI or not.

▲

mcswell 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Straw man. The person who you're responding to talked about "equivalent statements" (emphasis added), whereas you appear to be talking about equivalent objects (AIs vs. brains), and pointing out the obvious flaw in this argument, that AIs aren't biology. The obvious flaw in the wrong argument, that is.