Marilyn Vos Savant may have a very high IQ, but do we have any particular reason to think that she has anything to contribute to the topics LW is concerned with? Or even interesting ideas in general?
I think she has interesting ideas for sure but maybe they are not directly related to LW. On the other hand I think she has quite a bit to say about intelligence, at least human intelligence.
I watched the old tv interview with her on youtube and liked it. With Langan—who I just heard about yesterday—the stuff he says in the TV piece shows a frightening failure of intelligence. And still it would be interesting, and maybe worthwhile to have a talk between him and EY.
I suggest Christopher Michael Langan, as roland said. His “Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe (CTMU)” ( download it at http://ctmu.org ) is very logical and conflicts in interesting ways with how Yudkowsky thinks of the universe at the most abstract level. Langan derives the need for an emergent unification of “syntax” (like the laws of physics) and “state” (like positions and times of objects) and that the universe must be a closure. I think he means the only possible states/syntaxes are very abstractly similar to quines. He proposes a third category, not determinism or random, but somewhere between that fits into his logical model in subtle ways.
QUOTE: The currency of telic feedback is a quantifiable self-selection parameter, generalized utility, a generalized property of law and state in the maximization of which they undergo mutual refinement (note that generalized utility is self-descriptive or autologous, intrinsically and retroactively defined within the system, and “pre-informational” in the sense that it assigns no
specific property to any specific object). Through telic feedback, a system retroactively self-configures by reflexively applying a “generalized utility function” to its internal existential potential or possible futures. In effect, the system brings itself into existence as a means of atemporal communication between its past and future whereby law and state, syntax and informational content, generate and refine each other across time to maximize total systemic self-utility. This defines a situation in which the true temporal identity of the system is a distributed point of temporal equilibrium that is both between and inclusive of past and future. In this sense, the system is timeless or atemporal.
When he says a system which tends toward a “generalized utility function”, I think he means, for example, our physics follow a geodesic, so geodesic would be their utility function.
When he says “intelligent design”, he is not referring to the common theory that there is some god that is not subject to the laws of physics which created physics and everything in the universe. He says reality created itself as a logical consequence of having to be a closure. I don’t agree with everything he says, but based only on the logical steps that lead up to that, him and Yudkowsky should have interesting things to talk about. Both are committed to obey logic and get rid of their assumptions, so there should be no unresolvable conflicts, but I expect lots of conflicts to start with.
Someone with very high IQ like:
Christopher Michael Langan (he is also an autodidact)
Marilyn Vos Savant
There is a list at : http://onemansblog.com/2007/11/08/the-massive-list-of-genius-people-with-the-highest-iq/
Marilyn Vos Savant may have a very high IQ, but do we have any particular reason to think that she has anything to contribute to the topics LW is concerned with? Or even interesting ideas in general?
I think she has interesting ideas for sure but maybe they are not directly related to LW. On the other hand I think she has quite a bit to say about intelligence, at least human intelligence.
Worth a try.
I watched the old tv interview with her on youtube and liked it. With Langan—who I just heard about yesterday—the stuff he says in the TV piece shows a frightening failure of intelligence. And still it would be interesting, and maybe worthwhile to have a talk between him and EY.
I just read a partial interview with Michael Langan and he is also interested in the topic of AI and has some ideas on it.
Link?
I suggest Christopher Michael Langan, as roland said. His “Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe (CTMU)” ( download it at http://ctmu.org ) is very logical and conflicts in interesting ways with how Yudkowsky thinks of the universe at the most abstract level. Langan derives the need for an emergent unification of “syntax” (like the laws of physics) and “state” (like positions and times of objects) and that the universe must be a closure. I think he means the only possible states/syntaxes are very abstractly similar to quines. He proposes a third category, not determinism or random, but somewhere between that fits into his logical model in subtle ways.
QUOTE: The currency of telic feedback is a quantifiable self-selection parameter, generalized utility, a generalized property of law and state in the maximization of which they undergo mutual refinement (note that generalized utility is self-descriptive or autologous, intrinsically and retroactively defined within the system, and “pre-informational” in the sense that it assigns no specific property to any specific object). Through telic feedback, a system retroactively self-configures by reflexively applying a “generalized utility function” to its internal existential potential or possible futures. In effect, the system brings itself into existence as a means of atemporal communication between its past and future whereby law and state, syntax and informational content, generate and refine each other across time to maximize total systemic self-utility. This defines a situation in which the true temporal identity of the system is a distributed point of temporal equilibrium that is both between and inclusive of past and future. In this sense, the system is timeless or atemporal.
When he says a system which tends toward a “generalized utility function”, I think he means, for example, our physics follow a geodesic, so geodesic would be their utility function.
He appears to be an ID proponent, though that is probably a simplification of his actual position.
When he says “intelligent design”, he is not referring to the common theory that there is some god that is not subject to the laws of physics which created physics and everything in the universe. He says reality created itself as a logical consequence of having to be a closure. I don’t agree with everything he says, but based only on the logical steps that lead up to that, him and Yudkowsky should have interesting things to talk about. Both are committed to obey logic and get rid of their assumptions, so there should be no unresolvable conflicts, but I expect lots of conflicts to start with.