Humans have an inherent flaw in that our brains are wired to see intelligence and reasoning where there is none. Our brains fill in data that simply isn’t there.
Folks see Jesus in burnt toast. Monet was a master of exploiting this where what’s really just blotches of color our brains fill into beautifully detailed images.
Our experience with LLMs is no different. Folks believe there is some deeper intelligence there but it’s all still just 1s and 0s on a computer chip. We’re interpreting things happening that simply are not happening.
You either have to accept that the brain can be described with math (like everything else we have ever known in the universe), or that there is a supernatural phenomenon that exists in the brain.
This is an inescapable conclusion that boils down to "Do you believe magic is real or not?"
Magic is real and you can have your unique special human intelligence.
Magic is not real, and the brain is just another computer crunching numbers.
> You either have to accept that the brain can be described with math (like everything else we have ever known in the universe)
Oh the irony of you talking about believing in magic. What do you base this wild claim on? Can you cite a single known physicist or mathematician that agrees?
> And so in its actual procedure physics studies not these inscrutable qualities, but pointer-readings which we can observe. The readings, it is true, reflect the fluctuations of the world-qualities; but our exact knowledge is of the readings, not of the qualities. The former have as much resemblance to the latter as a telephone number has to a subscriber.
I'd be delighted if rather than an old dead guy quote, you could provide an actual example of something math comes up short in describing, for lack of mathematical ability of course, not lack of human knowledge or practicality.
So yes, you can cite no serious scientists. And you don't understand the words of those, be they current ones or any of the heroes of either field, when they explain why that is.
You don't even need to believe them, just think about how you would ever be sure you know objective reality fully. Actually do it.
When I was a little kid, my go to thought experiment was imagining atoms as balls that we can't crack open that are filled with sand, and that even if we could find the formulas that describe their movements perfectly, we could never know if that's how atoms move, or if there's something inside them (the sand). Really dumb, but I was like 9 yo and knew nothing, never heard of Gödel or quantum mechanics (what's your excuse?). But I still could understand, not intuitively, but by actually thinking (not just talking) about it, that you can never be 100% sure from inside. Even if you found out everything, and your model of the world matches it perfectly, you could never be sure that it is so. And it turns out this is true and an old discovery. If you could disprove it, you would be famous for millenia, maybe forever. Bluffing on HN won't get you there.
cmiles8 · · focus · HN ↗
Folks see Jesus in burnt toast. Monet was a master of exploiting this where what’s really just blotches of color our brains fill into beautifully detailed images.
Our experience with LLMs is no different. Folks believe there is some deeper intelligence there but it’s all still just 1s and 0s on a computer chip. We’re interpreting things happening that simply are not happening.
WarmWash · · focus · HN ↗
You either have to accept that the brain can be described with math (like everything else we have ever known in the universe), or that there is a supernatural phenomenon that exists in the brain.
This is an inescapable conclusion that boils down to "Do you believe magic is real or not?"
Magic is real and you can have your unique special human intelligence.
Magic is not real, and the brain is just another computer crunching numbers.
customguy · · focus · HN ↗
Oh the irony of you talking about believing in magic. What do you base this wild claim on? Can you cite a single known physicist or mathematician that agrees?
> And so in its actual procedure physics studies not these inscrutable qualities, but pointer-readings which we can observe. The readings, it is true, reflect the fluctuations of the world-qualities; but our exact knowledge is of the readings, not of the qualities. The former have as much resemblance to the latter as a telephone number has to a subscriber.
-- Arthur Stanley Eddington
WarmWash · · focus · HN ↗
customguy · · focus · HN ↗
You don't even need to believe them, just think about how you would ever be sure you know objective reality fully. Actually do it.
When I was a little kid, my go to thought experiment was imagining atoms as balls that we can't crack open that are filled with sand, and that even if we could find the formulas that describe their movements perfectly, we could never know if that's how atoms move, or if there's something inside them (the sand). Really dumb, but I was like 9 yo and knew nothing, never heard of Gödel or quantum mechanics (what's your excuse?). But I still could understand, not intuitively, but by actually thinking (not just talking) about it, that you can never be 100% sure from inside. Even if you found out everything, and your model of the world matches it perfectly, you could never be sure that it is so. And it turns out this is true and an old discovery. If you could disprove it, you would be famous for millenia, maybe forever. Bluffing on HN won't get you there.
WarmWash · · focus · HN ↗
Where does math come short?