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The Petabyte Age: The End of Theory & the (exponential) advancement of Science

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Posts

  • tbloxhamtbloxham Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    Statistics is not going to replace the scientific method. Computers could, of course, become sentient and able to devise complicated hypotheses on their own but then we'd just be talking about a different type of thing entirely - an AI.
    And it's beginning right now... Going beyond Polymorphic code, and creating compilers that compile better compilers...ad inifintum, etc all on their own! 8-)

    Somebody call John Connor right now. D:

    I think you're giving that program a bit too much credit, its just creating a program which remembers what ran well on previous ASIC hardware and can stitch together code segments to perform processes in the optimum time based on that. It's just another tool for searching a database.

    tbloxham on
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  • Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    tbloxham wrote: »
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    Statistics is not going to replace the scientific method. Computers could, of course, become sentient and able to devise complicated hypotheses on their own but then we'd just be talking about a different type of thing entirely - an AI.
    And it's beginning right now... Going beyond Polymorphic code, and creating compilers that compile better compilers...ad inifintum, etc all on their own! 8-)

    Somebody call John Connor right now. D:

    I think you're giving that program a bit too much credit, its just creating a program which remembers what ran well on previous ASIC hardware and can stitch together code segments to perform processes in the optimum time based on that. It's just another tool for searching a database.
    Baby steps, baby steps...

    Zilla360 on
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  • stiliststilist Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    tbloxham wrote: »
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    Statistics is not going to replace the scientific method. Computers could, of course, become sentient and able to devise complicated hypotheses on their own but then we'd just be talking about a different type of thing entirely - an AI.
    And it's beginning right now... Going beyond Polymorphic code, and creating compilers that compile better compilers...ad inifintum, etc all on their own! 8-)

    Somebody call John Connor right now. D:
    I think you're giving that program a bit too much credit, its just creating a program which remembers what ran well on previous ASIC hardware and can stitch together code segments to perform processes in the optimum time based on that. It's just another tool for searching a database.
    Baby steps, baby steps...
    There’s something of a difference between optimising compilers and artificial intelligence.

    stilist on
    I poop things on my site and twitter
  • Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    stilist wrote: »
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    tbloxham wrote: »
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    Statistics is not going to replace the scientific method. Computers could, of course, become sentient and able to devise complicated hypotheses on their own but then we'd just be talking about a different type of thing entirely - an AI.
    And it's beginning right now... Going beyond Polymorphic code, and creating compilers that compile better compilers...ad inifintum, etc all on their own! 8-)

    Somebody call John Connor right now. D:
    I think you're giving that program a bit too much credit, its just creating a program which remembers what ran well on previous ASIC hardware and can stitch together code segments to perform processes in the optimum time based on that. It's just another tool for searching a database.
    Baby steps, baby steps...
    There’s something of a difference between self-optimising compilers and artificial intelligence constructs.
    It's all executable, and we now have memristors, so...?
    If you fail to see the links between seemingly disparate fields of inquiry, then that's ok. But not being open to exploring new possibilities is what creationists want. And you're not one of those are you? :P
    Baby steps, baby steps... And then we make footprints on the moon...

    Zilla360 on
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  • stiliststilist Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    It doesn’t bother you that you’re talking a load of tripe? You’d be just as accurate saying that being able to count higher than ten brings somebody closer to creating AI.

    Ignoring that this has little to do with the thread’s original topic, there is a vast difference between telling a computer to record the speed at which different code runs and creating a computer that behaves like a human. Emergent data patterns are not that close to emergent intelligence.

    stilist on
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  • tbloxhamtbloxham Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    stilist wrote: »
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    tbloxham wrote: »
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    Statistics is not going to replace the scientific method. Computers could, of course, become sentient and able to devise complicated hypotheses on their own but then we'd just be talking about a different type of thing entirely - an AI.
    And it's beginning right now... Going beyond Polymorphic code, and creating compilers that compile better compilers...ad inifintum, etc all on their own! 8-)

    Somebody call John Connor right now. D:
    I think you're giving that program a bit too much credit, its just creating a program which remembers what ran well on previous ASIC hardware and can stitch together code segments to perform processes in the optimum time based on that. It's just another tool for searching a database.
    Baby steps, baby steps...
    There’s something of a difference between self-optimising compilers and artificial intelligence constructs.
    It's all executable, and we now have memristors, so...?
    If you fail to see the links between seemingly disparate fields of inquiry, then that's ok. But not being open to exploring new possibilities is what creationists want. And you're not one of those are you? :P
    Baby steps, baby steps... And then we make footprints on the moon...

    But these compilers are self optimising to do tasks that are defined by users using code which is prepared by users. The compiler can assemble it into a more optimised form by trial and error and by consulting its "how things work database" but it can't try a unique and new way, nor can it conceive of new tasks and operations to carry out. Consulting databases is easy, and better human written code languages which are more object orientated of course allow computers to assemble code together more flexibly, but all it really is doing is consulting a database.

    The steps towards an AI would involve developing a computer which could think in an innovative fashion, and decide on new tasks that it found interesting. This program is just like the chess playing AI's, people thought that they were steps towards a real AI, but in fact all they were were steps towards a complete understanding of chess. When the system optimises itself in the same way a human would, then we are on our way.

    tbloxham on
    "That is cool" - Abraham Lincoln
  • seabassseabass Doctor MassachusettsRegistered User regular
    edited July 2008
    tbloxham wrote: »

    But these compilers are self optimising to do tasks that are defined by users using code which is prepared by users. The compiler can assemble it into a more optimised form by trial and error and by consulting its "how things work database" but it can't try a unique and new way, nor can it conceive of new tasks and operations to carry out. Consulting databases is easy, and better human written code languages which are more object orientated of course allow computers to assemble code together more flexibly, but all it really is doing is consulting a database.

    The steps towards an AI would involve developing a computer which could think in an innovative fashion, and decide on new tasks that it found interesting. This program is just like the chess playing AI's, people thought that they were steps towards a real AI, but in fact all they were were steps towards a complete understanding of chess. When the system optimises itself in the same way a human would, then we are on our way.

    "I don't mean to alarm you, but we've made a machine that can think" is probably the relevant quote here, about your chess and your thinking. If you define intelligence as being able to play chess, those machines are certainly smart as hell. I think that people saying things like 'hold on its thinking' of computers is really telling too, but if we want to talk about the Chinese room, maybe that could be its own thread.

    Typically, what the public thinks of as AI and what AI researchers do all day are very different. Most of us aren't trying to create brains, though we wish we could. Lots of people work in search, and are trying to do work on optimization problems. Some folks work in planning. Others write theorem provers. Some people like tooling around with robots, but very few people (maybe just Minsky?) are trying to make a brain. I guess what I'm saying here is that I take issues with the term 'real AI'. Real AI is what optimizes UPS routes to include fewer left turns and what decides which research tasks happen first on the mars rover. Thats whats real, or at least what is done.

    Now, I think the problem most people are going to bring up with AI as a researcher is the inability to be creative, in so far as it applies to making relevant hypothesis. If we have a language with which we can describe the world, even if there are an infinite number of statements, we could just set a machine away on it, and ask it to prove or disprove everything it can state. So, proving things doesn't require creativity or insight... prioritizing your efforts takes both.

    That being said, even if machines can't be made to self evolve into scientific super-minds, they do take care of a lot of the crap we'd otherwise have to do by hand, and in that capacity more computing resources, better tools to run on them, and better models for using both have already been snowballing, and should continue to.

    seabass on
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  • Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I thought this was interesting and related to the direction this discussion was going in:
    If you are still not convinced, perhaps it helps to take a longer view. The idea of a self-replicating machine can be traced back to remarks made by the Queen of Sweden to René Descartes, but they were more seriously explored in the 19th century by Samuel Butler, who described a machine that could mimic the biological process of plants in his novel Erewhon.
    The machine that copies itself!

    Also perhaps the thread title is a bit too strongly worded, but consider that the scientific method is built on tools of thought and logic, and that as we augment and extend those tools, we may end up changing the whole process beyond that which we recognize as 'the method' today; just as relativity and the laws of motion complement each other. :)

    Zilla360 on
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  • Loren MichaelLoren Michael Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    To be fair my reference is high school history and the break down of the course probably wasn't great in timelining the different empires so I'll take your word for it.
    You and everyone else in this thread, should read Nonzero. :P

    Also, take a look at the links I posted on the last page.

    Loren Michael on
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  • Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
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  • Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    stilist wrote: »
    Emergent data patterns are not that close to emergent intelligence.
    Don't you yourself operate of the basis of procedural recall, using other seemingly unassociated yet linked memories to reconstruct a linear sequence of events?

    Like remembering where your keys are by thinking of the beer you drank last night? :P

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  • saggiosaggio Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    stilist wrote: »
    Emergent data patterns are not that close to emergent intelligence.
    Don't you yourself operate of the basis of procedural recall, using other seemingly unassociated yet linked memories to reconstruct a linear sequence of events?

    Like remembering where your keys are by thinking of the beer you drank last night? :P

    No.

    saggio on
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  • Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    saggio wrote: »
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    stilist wrote: »
    Emergent data patterns are not that close to emergent intelligence.
    Don't you yourself operate of the basis of procedural recall, using other seemingly unassociated yet linked memories to reconstruct a linear sequence of events?

    Like remembering where your keys are by thinking of the beer you drank last night? :P

    No.
    So what is your alternative method?

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  • saggiosaggio Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    I think you are assuming memory and understanding to be one and the same. It isn't.

    saggio on
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  • EchoEcho ski-bap ba-dapModerator mod
    edited July 2008
    I guess I was kind of implying the whole deal with the dark ages were that they really were basically a failure of civilization for a couple hundred years. Though I suppose that isn't really fair to the progress in China and the Middle East during this time - still, in terms of mathematics it would've been fantastic if Greece had kept calculus going.

    For all the credit Aristotle gets, he probably held science back for at least a century.

    Being a scifi geek this thread interests me greatly. Singularity stuff makes for great fiction.

    Echo on
  • Mr_RoseMr_Rose 83 Blue Ridge Protects the Holy Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Echo wrote: »
    For all the credit Aristotle gets, he probably held science back for at least a century.

    Being a scifi geek this thread interests me greatly. Singularity stuff makes for great fiction.
    Have you heard of Dresden Codak?

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  • redxredx I(x)=2(x)+1 whole numbersRegistered User regular
    edited July 2008
    ieee Spectrum recently did a piece on Singularity some neat bits. Not exactly hard science or anything, but still fairly interesting.

    redx on
    They moistly come out at night, moistly.
  • Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Mr_Rose wrote: »
    Echo wrote: »
    For all the credit Aristotle gets, he probably held science back for at least a century.

    Being a scifi geek this thread interests me greatly. Singularity stuff makes for great fiction.
    Have you heard of Dresden Codak?
    gletterstu3.jpg
    Religions as PLC's, that's brilliant. Invest in Jebus today! :lol:

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  • Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Alright, now this is awesome: Of course, all skepticism/negativity is welcome and encouraged, since atheism isn't a religion... :P

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  • Zilla360Zilla360 21st Century. |She/Her| Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Comment taken from a linked IEEE singularity article:

    RAPTURE TAKE PLACE

    BEFORE OR AFTER THE ANTI-CHRIST COMES ON EARTH???


    FIRST OF ALL THERE WILL BE MORE THAN ONE

    ANTI-CHRIST THAT PEOPLE ON EARTH WILL

    HAVE TO DEAL WITH!

    THE BIBLE LETS US KNOW THERE WILL BE

    MANY ANTI-CHRIST IN:

    MATTHEW 24: 4 - 5

    & MATTHEW 24: 23 - 24.

    AND I THINK THERE WILL BE AT LEAST THREE MAJOR ANTI-CHRIST BECAUSE EACH ONE OF THEM WILL

    TRY TO COPY-CAT A PART OF THE TRINITY!

    IN OTHER WORDS, ONE ANTI-CHRIST WILL

    TRY TO COPY-CAT AND BE (GOD-THE FATHER)!

    AND ONE ANTI-CHRIST WILL TRY TO COPY-CAT

    AND BE (GOD-THE SON)!

    AND I ASSURE YOU THAT THIS ONE IS

    BARACK OBAMA!!

    AND I CAN PROVE IT IN THE BIBLE!!

    AND THE THIRD MAJOR ANTI-CHRIST

    WILL TRY TO COPY-CAT AND BE

    (GOD-THE HOLY SPIRIT)!

    NOW THE ONE THAT TRIES TO COPY-CAT

    GOD THE FATHER WILL SIT IN THE TEMPLE

    OF GOD AS IF HE REALLY IS GOD!

    *2THESSALONIANS 2: 3 - 4!

    AND MANY MANY PEOPLE WILL FALL FOR HIM! ESPECIALLY THOSE THAT DON'T HAVE ENOUGH OIL IN THEIR LAMP!

    *MATTHEW 25: 1 - 13!

    NOW THE BIBLE LETS US KNOW THAT NO MAN KNOWS

    THE DAY OR THE HOUR THAT JESUS WILL

    COME BACK!!

    BUT WHAT I DO KNOW IS THAT THE RAPTURE

    WILL NOT TAKE PLACE UNTIL THE ANTI-CHRIST

    THAT WILL SIT IN THE TEMPLE OF GOD AS IF HE

    IS GOD GETS REVEALED TO THE SAINTS!

    *2THESSALONIANS 2:3

    AND SO FAR THIS PARTICULAR

    ANTI-CHRIST HAS NOT BEEN REVEALED

    TO ME OR ANY OTHER OF THE

    THE SAINTS YET AS FAR AS I KNOW OF AND NEITHER HAVE I HEARD OF AN

    ANTI-CHRIST YET SO FAR THAT HAS

    ALREADY SAT IN THE TEMPLE OF GOD AS IF HE REALLY IS GOD!

    SO THE RAPTURE WILL TAKE PLACE AFTER THIS PARTICULAR ANTI-CHRIST IS

    REVEALED!


    SINCE GOD IS THE ONLY ONE THAT IS

    BIG ENOUGH, BAD ENOUGH, BOLD ENOUGH

    AND BOSSY ENOUGH TO BEAT OR DESTROY THE ANTI-CHRIST (BARACK OBAMA), THEREFORE:

    THE ONLY ONLY SOLUTION TO

    OUR ANTI-CHRIST PROBLEM:

    WE MUST FIND GOD, COME TO GOD, GET WITH GOD, RECEIVE GOD, STAY WITH GOD, KEEP GOD, HOLD ON TO GOD & STICK WITH GOD!

    BECAUSE GOD SO LOVED THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD THAT HE GAVE HIS ONLY BEGOTTEN SON AND WHOSO-EVER BELIEVETH IN HIM AND WHOSO-EVER SERVES HIM TO THE FULLEST AND

    WHOSO-EVER KEEPS ALL TEN OF HIS COMMANDMENTS AND WHOSO-EVER LOVES HIS NEIGHBOR AS HIS SELF, SHALL NOT PERISH!!

    NO MATTER HOW MANY ANTI-CHRIST SHALL COME ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH!!!!!!!

    BECAUSE INSTEAD OF PERISHING AND INSTEAD OF GOD LETTING YOU PERISH, GOD WILL GIVE YOU EVERLASTING LIFE!!!!

    FROM: Mister Truthful

    EMAIL: [email protected]

    P.S. PLEASE EMAIL ME:

    SO THAT I CAN ANSWER ANY OF YOUR

    QUESTIONS, COMMENTS OR CONCERNS

    ABOUT THE END TIME, THE WARS, THE

    RAPTURE, THE BEAST OR THE ANTI-

    CHRIST OR THE NEW BABYLON OR

    HELL OR THE TRIBULATION OR THE

    EARTHQUAKES OR THE MARK

    OF THE BEAST!

    BECAUSE THESE ARE THE

    THINGS THAT I HAVE STUDIED
    Aaah, nooo, Zombie Barack Obama! Run awaay!

    You stay crazy and classy, internets. :lol:

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  • Loren MichaelLoren Michael Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Zilla360 wrote: »
    Alright, now this is awesome: Of course, all skepticism/negativity is welcome and encouraged, since atheism isn't a religion... :P

    Okay, yeah, that's pretty goddamn awesome.

    Loren Michael on
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  • Loren MichaelLoren Michael Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Echo wrote: »
    I guess I was kind of implying the whole deal with the dark ages were that they really were basically a failure of civilization for a couple hundred years. Though I suppose that isn't really fair to the progress in China and the Middle East during this time - still, in terms of mathematics it would've been fantastic if Greece had kept calculus going.

    For all the credit Aristotle gets, he probably held science back for at least a century.

    I thought it was in vogue for to shit on Aristotle these days, actually.

    He is inextricable from the march of history. He is also one of the singularly great figures in intellectual history. He got stuff wrong, yes. But there is an enormous wealth of stuff that came from him that is incredibly original dealing with a vast array of subjects.

    Loren Michael on
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