[ExI] The symbol grounding problem in strong AI

Stathis Papaioannou stathisp at gmail.com
Sat Dec 19 01:13:30 UTC 2009


2009/12/19 Damien Broderick <thespike at satx.rr.com>:
> On 12/18/2009 5:33 PM, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
>
>> Is a computer any more computational than a landslide?
>
> Is gravity plus friction plus and the jostling of innumerable fragments
> tumbling in a chaotic manner functionally identical to a carefully
> noise-minimized algorithm-governed computation?

They are different processes, of course, but the behaviour of an
actual, physical computer is governed by exactly the same physical
laws as that of the landslide. Since there is no fundamental physical
difference between a computer implementing a program and any other
physical process it is not possible, in general, to examine an
intelligently behaving alien machine and decide whether it is a
computer or a non-computational brain.


-- 
Stathis Papaioannou



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