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skeptical_lurker comments on Superintelligence 5: Forms of Superintelligence - Less Wrong
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How strongly does the fact that neurons fire ten million times less frequently than rates of modern microprocessors suggest that biological brains are radically less efficient than artificial minds could be? (p59)
The first part of the sentence compares brains with current computers, the second part with theoretical possible artificial minds. Modern computers are less efficient than brains in pretty much every other respect.
Really? Because a 2kg laptop seems better than a brain at recognizing songs, identifying authors of writing samples, diagnosing diseases from symptoms, playing Jeopardy...
EDIT No, seriously, I don't understand in what respects modern computer hardware is less efficient than brain hardware. I see how computer software is deficient, and I see some ways that brain hardware seems better (simulating neurons, healing, possibly heat dissipation), but it's not at all obvious to me in what facets superior brain hardware causes superior results.
And the brain is better at writing songs,text, medical research...
In general, humans still beat machines at most mental tasks, except for ones which require monotony/speed.
My primary point is that the 'processing power' of the brain is estimated at somewhere between 10^15 and 10^19 flops. The lower bound has already been surpassed by supercomputers, but these computers are huge, orders or magnitude bigger and more power hungry than brains, so brains are more efficient. And yes, many algorithms run better on small numbers of fast processors, but the best known machine learning algorithms are massively parallel.