X-Message-Number: 8582
Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 23:29:22 -0400
From: Michael Riskin <>
Subject: Intelligence

I am new to these electronic discussions of intelligence, human or
artificial...which by the way makes me wonder why it is assumed that human
intelligence is not also standardly referred to as " artificial" also.
After all.. it was created and not by the human itself, unless one assumes
it came about in terms of an immaculate conception or a spontaneous
combustion. 

Anyway, one day god is talking to adam and he says ' Adam....i have some
good news and some bad news. The good news is that I created you with both
a brain and a penis. The bad news is that you only have enough blood to run
one at a time". Maybe Adam is half intelligent...or maybe he is simply
intelligent enough to know that getting laid is more important than
thinking, especially since god will take care of him anyway in the long run
=2E (Anyone ever seen a sexy looking angel?...i havent).

So...i have assumed from these discussions , that computer intelligence
assumes the need to go through a specific series of analyses to come to a
conclusion. You know...like deep blue playing chess, whereas maybe 
kasparov thinks ' ah, i know this one is pretty good and anyway i am too
tired or hungover to spend much time right now in this benign situation, or
even, let me make this move...i nevr did it before and it might be
entertaining to see how it turns out and it might even require my opponent
to take a lot of time figuring it out so i can rest". Mybe even kasparov
knows that 12 times 12 is 144 ( that's right...isnt it?) with ZERO compute
time. The question and the answer appears simultaneously...even on a NEW
problem. maybe that is intelligence ...can any artificail intelligence do
that?

Now ....chess is a finite activity and unless kasparove can figure out a
way to cheat and not get caught, he will ultimately have to lose. In some
sense, intelligence is the ability to therefore cheat and not follow the
rules and not get caught, which may be tricky to teach a computer that is
by its' nature, designed to follow rules. Of course the rules have been
taught it by a human, and while the machine may then learn and create its
own rules, it is still bound by what it was originally taught. Cheating is
actually a productive way of learning and acting intelligent actually since
it means by definition exploring some aspect of a situation unprogrammed. =


Well...can intelligence be measured by the degree of subjective pleasure it
can generate for its owner?  is there anything else than pleasure ( or
pain) BTW? A woman might call her mate " intelligent" if he is able to
produce plasure for her under any circumstances. I once had a young woman
say to me " Michael...you have a most intelligent tonque" What do you think
she meant by that? Undoubtably, a computer could drive a vibrating dildo in
such a manner as to produce maximum stimulation, but could it also have her
feel that she has followed the gender imperative and chosen a suitable
mate? The hell with kasparov and blue. i say bring on traci lords and a sex
machine.

Anyway..thanks for indulging me. I have been working all day...got a
bacterial infection and generally feel crappy and writing this cheered me
up.

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