[ExI] all we are is just llms

[Brent Allsop]

Hi Gordon and Ben,
It is very interesting, educational, and insightful to follow these
conversations, and see your different ways of thinking about things.
I have a question for you both.  I'm interested to see how your answers
will differ.
CPUs have registers, and the computations are always done between
registers.  Things like comparison, addition, exclusive or and all that
kind of stuff.
Would either of you guys label those mechanisms done in the CPU as
"communication" or "language"?







On Sat, Apr 22, 2023 at 4:01 AM Gordon Swobe via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> On Sat, Apr 22, 2023 at 2:43 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>
>> (you think that pointing is not a language? I suspect many deaf people
>> would disagree)
>>
>
> Fine with me. Sign language is also a form of language.
>
>
>> This is why referring to linguistics is not helping.
>>
>
> ? Because we are going to include sign language in our definition of
> language, linguistics is not helping? Linguists consider sign language also
> to be a form of language.
>
> In our primitive caveman example, in which he points at let us say an
> animal, his first "words" in sign language translate to something like
> "Look over there! See what I see?" Based on how frantic or calm is his
> gesturing, his interlocutor might also know if his friend perceives the
> animal as a threat or as food. Now he has two words. Before long, Fred and
> Barney are also grunting identifiable noises as their sign language evolves
> into more complex verbal language.
>
>
>> As I said earlier, it's the wrong discipline here.
>>
>
> Language models model language and linguistics is the science of
> language.
>
> > Referents, being internal conceptual models, *are made of language*.
> They must be, because there's nothing else to work with, in the brain.
>
> Really? My brain has visual perceptions and sounds and imaginations and
> non-verbal thoughts and music and many things going on that can be
> *described* with language but are not language.
>
> I understand what you are trying to say about the "language of the brain"
> but I would say you are conflating neurology and language.
>
> The statement "referents are made of language" is simply false on the
> definition of referent. Only a tiny subset of words in the English language
> have language as referents. Linguists call them meta-words. They are parts
> of speech and similar. For example, the word "nouns" refers to the set of
> all nouns.
>
> -gts
>
>>
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