Rain comments on Undiscriminating Skepticism - Less Wrong

97 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 14 March 2010 11:23PM

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Comment author: Rain 15 March 2010 03:40:35AM *  12 points [-]

I've used AI as a sniff test many times (>10 tests), along with better-than-human humans (posthumans) and engineered immortality (SENS). Very few people, even those who are smart and educated, are able to argue against them rationally. Every time I've been given more than 10 minutes to discuss the point with someone who disagrees they're possible, it comes down to some sort of mystical mysteriousness which humankind cannot fathom or recreate. Quite often (>20%), it's even revealed a religiosity in the person they don't express in any other way apparent to me (god of the gaps).

Comment author: ExAequali 15 October 2013 09:10:52AM 0 points [-]

So is the source of consciousness not a mystery? Or is consciousness not necessary for intelligence?

Comment author: ArisKatsaris 15 October 2013 10:48:33AM 0 points [-]

Or is consciousness not necessary for intelligence?

Indeed. If we mean "intelligence" as ability to optimize an arbitrary goal X, I don't see either consciousness or intelligence being at all necessary for the other. These are two completely different things.

Consciousness is currently mysterious (at least for me), intelligence not really.

Comment author: ExAequali 27 October 2013 07:43:32AM *  0 points [-]

This article makes some interesting points about the meaning of intelligence. Curious what you think of Hofstadter's arguments.