Nobody knows what intelligence is. We've recently discovered a lot of things that it isn't.

fasterik 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Intelligence is a word we invent to describe things we see in nature. We don't "discover" intelligence like it's some natural resource. To say we know nothing about it is also a bit strange. Cognitive science has been studying it for decades. Of course it's hard to give a precise definition, but it's related to capabilities like abstraction, reasoning, planning, problem solving, etc.

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infinite_spin 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Why would a set of dictionary definitions not suffice?

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mitxela 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Those are distillations of existing knowledge. They are necessarily behind the status quo. "You can't call this newfangled contraption a computer, because a computer is a person!"

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handoflixue an hour ago | parent | next [-]

> They are necessarily behind the status quo.

That seems like a really bizarre way to describe a tool that solved an open Millennium Prize Problem. They are, empirically and repeatedly, ahead of the status quo.

So if your argument depends on them being behind the status quo, reality has already disproven it multiple times over.

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infinite_spin 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> Those are distillations of existing knowledge.

Definitions are "formal statements of the meaning or significance of a word, phrase, idiom, etc" (https://www.dictionary.com/browse/definition)

> They are necessarily behind the status quo.

The existing state or condition would be what is written in the dictionary, not whatever personal definitions you've constructed.

> "You can't call this newfangled contraption a computer, because a computer is a person!"

Seems like a straw man. A computer is not a mammal, no matter how much you twist a set of definitions.

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quicklime 41 minutes ago | parent [-]

> A computer is not a mammal, no matter how much you twist a set of definitions.

I’m not the person you replied to, but I believe they’re referring to the occupation of “computer”:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_(occupation)

So yes, at one time all computers were mammals.

The people who write dictionaries generally take a descriptivist approach, that’s why slang terms enter the dictionary after they start to become popular.

The state of the art of human knowledge would be another step ahead of the common use of any language.

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infinite_spin 34 minutes ago | parent [-]

That's an interesting take, and I can see how "computer" could refer to a human a hundred years ago, but they also mentioned "status quo", which should indicate that a reasonable person should use a modern definition.

	▲	quicklime 22 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Again I’m not the person who wrote the comment, but I think they were exaggerating for effect and maybe lost the audience in doing so. While “computer” has meant the same thing for many decades now, the term “intelligence” really does seem like a moving goalpost?