mannykannot

10 ms·

1.
by mannykannot 12d ago
You are not wrong, but I think atleastoptimal's suggestion was that descriptions like "next-token predictor" are often used to imply that there's not much to see here, perhaps with an implied "obviously" in the
2.
by mannykannot 12d ago
Yes, but I think the same construction could also be used to characterize the first system; it determines the next move based on a prediction of its reward signal, where its reward signal is a measure of how likely it is that a grand ma
3.
by mannykannot 13d ago
I guess you are right, but it makes it more interesting if the picks are not almost all from the recent past. On the other hand, I would also guess that spreading the picks evenly across the time range might result in many being from times
4.
by mannykannot 15d ago
IANAL, but it seems the suit against Harvard is still in progress, as far as I can tell: Harvard is seeking a summary judgement, and on August 5 the judge granted Gino's request to file "a renewed Statement of Additional Material
5.
by mannykannot 17d ago
Just to be clear, my objection to the "simulated rain won't get you wet" argument is not predicated on any assumptions about brains, minds, or the relationship between the two, and in my presentation of that objection in the
6.
by mannykannot 18d ago
This is a follow-up to my previous reply, which may appear below this one. In that one, I forgot to say something about this: ‘…a bit pattern in computer memory [only] means “pain” because of how a program and its users interpret or employ
7.
by mannykannot 18d ago
I think there is an important distinction here that you are missing. The principle that a simulation is not the thing being simulated is true in general, but it cannot be used to justify the claim that there can be no equivalences between a
8.
by mannykannot 18d ago
The one thing that I think all philosophers agree on is that the only confirmed cases of consciousness discovered so far are biological. They are divided over whether there is anything fundamentally more metaphysical about it than other bi
9.
by mannykannot 20d ago
Let's start in the middle, where you say I wrote "When you have digitally modeled a brain such that the model responds to its inputs as a brain does, then you have built a brain." What I actually wrote was this: "Then, p
10.
by mannykannot 20d ago
Where does it appear outside of biology?
11.
by mannykannot 20d ago
A digital simulation of an Enigma machine is not just abstract relationships. Its program is, but the program is not the simulation; the simulation is the program running on suitable hardware, which provides the causal element. Note that th
12.
by mannykannot 20d ago
Ah, thanks - I thought you were trying to save the "a simulation is never the real thing" by substituting a different word when it is clear that the simulation is doing what the real thing does. This is a tactic I think of as &quo
13.
by mannykannot 20d ago
What, then, is the thing that you allege I am asserting the nonexistence of in this sentence? Furthermore, this sentence does not state something I am asserting, it is something that ratelimitsteve would have difficulty denying while being
14.
by mannykannot 20d ago
Consciousness appears to be a biological phenomenon, but so too are metabolism, reproduction and evolution. Are these also metaphysical concepts?
15.
by mannykannot 20d ago
> You can assert there is no such thing... No such thing as what? As far as I can tell, I have asserted no such thing as there being no such thing, whatever it is.
16.
by mannykannot 20d ago
I'm not arguing one way or another on such issues; Here, I am just pointing out how irrelevant the "a simulated rainstorm does not get you wet" argument is, when presented as blocking the possibility of a brain simulation hav
17.
by mannykannot 20d ago
Then, presumably, you will also hold that when you have digitally modeled a brain such that the model responds to its inputs as a brain does, then you have built a brain. Tendentiously redefining the word "simulation" in an atte
18.
by mannykannot 20d ago
When John Searle first published his so-called "Chinese Room" argument ( https://web-archive.southampton.ac.uk/cogprints.org/7150/1/1... ) he included his responses to several counter-arguments that h
19.
by mannykannot 20d ago
Yet when you model an Enigma machine, it does encrypt and decrypt messages.
20.
by mannykannot 2mo ago
I take my previous phone kayaking. Once I have downloaded the appropriate maps over wifi, I can use it for navigation, logging and photography without being worried by the prospect of dropping it in the water.
21.
by mannykannot 2mo ago
And don't forget the Vikings, who may provide the best analogy to the Sea Peoples.
22.
by mannykannot 2mo ago
It looks very much like it: Julian James, 'The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind' (see [1]), which influenced Neal Stephenson's writing of Snow Crash. Scott Alexander wrote a critique of it beginn
23.
by mannykannot 2mo ago
Why complicate matters with pasta at all when spider silk is, at least metaphorically and rhetorically, at hand? As hinted at by its 2017 postscript, this article is a mess of incommensurable comparisons.
24.
by mannykannot 3mo ago
This seems to tacitly assume that the outliers on either side have equivalent weight with respect to whatever is being investigated, while the explicit premise behind this proposal is that in this case they do not.
25.
by mannykannot 3mo ago
I take your point, as demonstrated here, that even straightforward written language can be completely misunderstood, and that emoji might help alleviate that, though how they could help in the particular case here is not clear to me.
26.
by mannykannot 3mo ago
> You choose to participate here instead of having face-to-face conversations. Nothing about the comment you are replying to implies an abstinence from face-to-face conversations, and the suggestion is not very plausible.
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by mannykannot 3mo ago
Anyone claiming those developments enabled the expression of something previously inexpressible would have been mistaken.
28.
by mannykannot 3mo ago
If only Keats or Plath had emoji!
29.
by mannykannot 3mo ago
And in the next paragraph: "However, there are niche applications where the much higher costs of computing in space could be justified. Examples include ... active collision avoidance in the increasingly crowded low Earth orbit."
30.
by mannykannot 3mo ago
It seems that in most ports they are required to hold and treat it (and, perhaps to a lesser extent, in inshore waters.) Fouling the places they take their customers to is ultimately bad for business.

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