X-Message-Number: 8636
Date: Mon, 29 Sep 1997 07:41:31 -0400
From: "John P. Pietrzak" <>
Subject: Re: Intelligence != Pregnancy
References: <>

Peter Merel wrote:
> Perhaps John Clarke's idea is just that intelligence is not
> recursively enumerable? [...]
> 
> This is entirely reasonable: since any problem may be transformed
> into the question of whether or not a particular program will halt,
> intelligence is always necessarily limited or else it could solve the
> general halting problem - which is demonstrably impossible.

I like the concept, but there is still a little trouble with applying
it in this case: the question of undecidability, as exemplified by the
halting problem, occurs wholly within the space of recursively
enumerable algorithms.  In other words, it is only after you have chosen
a well-defined recursively enumerable algorithm that you can ask if it
will halt or not.  It may be the case that intelligence is a problem
that falls into this category, but there are too many vague and
conflicting ideas about it right now to achieve a good definition.

And, in fact, as you point out, such a definition may be impossible:

> And then again it remains to be demonstrated that intelligence is not
> a relative criterion.

Right now, it definitely _is_ a relative criterion, as tests like the
Turing Test show.  The general concept of intelligence is widespread,
but agreement between people on the details is lacking, so each person
currently must make up their own mind themselves.

> So it seems John Pietrzak may be barking up a tree that isn't there
> - intelligence as an absolute criterion appears to mean nothing at
> all.

I certainly hope not. :)  It's true, there may be no absolute criterion
for intelligence.  As John Clark points out in his latest messages,
there may in fact be no absolute criterion for anything anywhere.  I'd
prefer not to believe that; I'd like to think that green really isn't
the same color as red, that I really did see the Atlantic Ocean last
week, that my name really is John Paul Pietrzak, and that intelligence
actually exists.


John

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=8636