It was pretty obvious the approach behind for instance Deep Blue wasn’t the way forward.
That’s a weird example to pick. What exactly about Deep Blue do you think wasn’t the way forward?
Comment on Why I don't use AI in 2025
Buffalox@lemmy.world 3 days ago
I find it funny that in the year 2000 while attending philosophy at University of Copenhagen I predicted strong AI around 2035. This was based on calculations of computational power, and estimates of software development.
At the time I had already been interested in AI development and matters of consciousness for many years. And I was a decent programmer. I already made self modifying code back in 1982. So I made this prediction at a time where AI wasn’t a very popular topic, and in the middle of a decades long futile desert walk without much progress.
And for 15 about years, very little continued to happen. It was pretty obvious the approach behind for instance Deep Blue wasn’t the way forward. But that seemed to be the norm for a long time.
But it looks to me that the understanding of how to build a strong AI is much much closer now. We might actually be halfway there!
I think we are pretty close to having the computational power needed now in AI specific datacenter clusters, but the software isn’t quite there yet.
I’m honestly not that interested in the current level of AI, although LLM can yield very impressive results at times, it’s also flawed.
partially self driving cars are kind of irrelevant IMO. But truly self driving cars will make all the difference, and be a cool achievement for current level of AI evolution when achieved.
So current level AI can be useful, but when we achieve strong AI it will make all the difference!
drspod@lemmy.ml 3 days ago
Buffalox@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Deep blue was mostly based on raw computational power, with very little ability to actually judge whether a draw was “good” without calculating the possibilities following it.
As I understand it, it only worked on Chess as a “mathematical” problem, and was incapable of judging strategic positions, except if it had “seen” it before, and already calculated the likely outcomes.
In short, there was very little intelligence, it was based only on memory and massive calculation power. Which indeed are aspects of intelligence, but only on a very low level.
General_Effort@lemmy.world 3 days ago
That seems to be aging well. But what is the definition of “strong AI”?
Buffalox@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Self aware consciousness on a human level. So it’s still far from a sure thing, because we haven’t figured consciousness out yet.
But I’m still very happy with my prediction, because AI is now at a way more useful and versatile level than ever, the use is already very widespread, and the research and investments have exploded the past decade. And AI can do things already that used to be impossible, for instance in image and movie generation and manipulation.
But I think the code will be broken soon, because self awareness is a thing of many degrees. For instance a dog is IMO obviously self aware, but it isn’t universally recognized, because it doesn’t have the same degree of selv awareness humans have.
This is a problem that dates back to 17th century and Descartes, who claimed for instance horses and dogs were mere automatons, and therefore couldn’t feel pain.
This of course completely in line with the Christian doctrine that animals don’t have souls.
But to me it seems self awareness like emotions don’t have to start at human level, it can start at a simpler level, that then can be developed further.
PS:
It’s true animals don’t have souls, in the sense of something magical provided by a god, because nobody has. Souls are not necessary to explain self awareness or consciousness or emotions.
General_Effort@lemmy.world 2 days ago
How do you operationally define consciousness?
Buffalox@lemmy.world 2 days ago
To understand what “I think therefore I am” means is a very high level of consciousness.
At lower levels things get more complicated to explain.
Buffalox@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Good question.
Obviously the Turing test doesn’t cut it, which I suspected already back then. And I’m sure when we finally have a self aware conscious AI, it will be debated violently.
We may think we have it before it’s actually real, some claim they believe some of the current systems display traits of consciousness already. I don’t believe that it’s even close yet though.
As wrong as Descartes was about animals, he still nailed it with “I think therefore I am” (cogito, ergo sum) www.britannica.com/topic/cogito-ergo-sum.
Unfortunately that’s about as far as we can get, before all sorts of problems arise regarding actual evidence. So philosophically in principle it is only the AI itself that can know for sure if it is truly conscious.
All I can say is that with the level of intelligence current leading AI have, they make silly mistakes that seems obvious if it was really conscious.
For instance as strong as they seem analyzing logic problems, they fail to realize that 1+1=2 <=> 2=1+1.
Such things will of course be ironed out, and maybe this on is already. But it shows the current model, isn’t good enough for the basic comprehension I would think would follow from consciousness.
Luckily there are people that know much more about this, and it will be interesting to hear what they have to say, when the time arrives. 😀