A material program living in a material world

In the beginning people thought General AI was just around the corner

Like in the ‘50s and ’60s? 😊

Yes, Newell and Simon were convinced that they already had a thinking machine (Computer Simulation of Human Thinking)

That does sound a bit ambitious, for the kind of equipment they had … 😅

Of course hype like that brought out many critics, famously Hubert Dreyfus

Not sure I’ve heard of him …

He was a philosopher, not an engineer, and wrote a book on “What Computers can’t do”

basically, that computers cannot understand the world like humans do

Oh, I remember Sam saying something about the world not being a chessboard , is it like that?

I think it is exactly that: computers lack the background knowledge about how things work

if it isn’t explicitly there in the algorithm, in the program, it doesn’t really exist for the computer

But that’s not how humans think, right?

Yep, Dreyfus was a phenomenologist and looked at how humans experience and act in the world

and AI’s lack the specific human way of “being in the world” as Heidegger called it

So that’s why AI’s would have a lot of trouble with stuff a little kid can do effortlessly? 😊

Indeed, but this also suggests a solution: put the AI in the world like a human 😊

Ah, of course, instead of a disembodied algorithm, you give it a robot body, and senses, and make it learn, and …

Bingo! Humans aren’t disembodied minds, so if you want human intelligence … 😊

Good stuff! But we should definitely check in with Sam about this too.

Sure, will do, and perhaps you can talk to Manuel, about the interview he did him?

Yes, and see if he has more material.

Great! Then we’ll catch up later 😉                                                         

See you soon! 😊