Hopefully_Anonymous comments on Timeless Control - Less Wrong

19 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 07 June 2008 05:16AM

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Comment author: Hopefully_Anonymous 09 June 2008 02:49:01AM 0 points [-]

Cyan, by that logic you could say that about a fire "it made a good choice to burn here, a bad choice to burn there" given that the spread of the fire would be as determined in your model as the development, existence, performance, and persistence of the chess-playing algorithm, or the human.

If the alogorithm was determined, it seems to me that claiming directions it went were "choices" is about as accurate as claiming the directions a fire goes are "choices". I think we can discuss phenomena like an algorithm playing chess against something else, and the results (win, loss, stronger position, weaker position) without using the word "choice" just like we can describe a fire's interaction with its environment without ascribing "choice" to the fire. To selectively use that word may prey on a common bias that we're susceptible to.

I'd write more to make my thoughts on this more clear, but I'm tired and I think my previous writing in this thread holds up pretty well.