I don’t understand what you mean by “intelligent,” “living systems,” “alive,” or “intrinsic goals” (so I don’t understand what any of these statements means in enough detail to determine what it would mean to falsify them). How much of the Sequences have you read? In particular, have you read through Mysterious Answers to Mysterious Questions or 37 Ways That Words Can Be Wrong?
Living Systems is from this guy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_systems. Even if he goes too far with his theorising, the basic idea makes sense—living systems are those which self-replicate, or maintain their structure in an environment that tries to break them down.
Thanks for pointing out that my use of terms was sloppy. The concepts of “intelligent” and “alive” I break down a bit more in the blog articles I linked. (I should point out that I see both concepts as a spectrum, not either/or). By “intrinsic goals” I mean self-defined goals—goals that arose through a process of evolution, not being built-in by some external designer.
My thoughts on these topics are still confused, so I’m in the process of clarifying them. Cheers for the feedback.
I don’t understand what you mean by “intelligent,” “living systems,” “alive,” or “intrinsic goals” (so I don’t understand what any of these statements means in enough detail to determine what it would mean to falsify them). How much of the Sequences have you read? In particular, have you read through Mysterious Answers to Mysterious Questions or 37 Ways That Words Can Be Wrong?
Living Systems is from this guy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_systems. Even if he goes too far with his theorising, the basic idea makes sense—living systems are those which self-replicate, or maintain their structure in an environment that tries to break them down.
Thanks for pointing out that my use of terms was sloppy. The concepts of “intelligent” and “alive” I break down a bit more in the blog articles I linked. (I should point out that I see both concepts as a spectrum, not either/or). By “intrinsic goals” I mean self-defined goals—goals that arose through a process of evolution, not being built-in by some external designer.
My thoughts on these topics are still confused, so I’m in the process of clarifying them. Cheers for the feedback.