Re: Singularity-worship

Eliezer Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Mon, 09 Dec 1996 22:46:43 -0600


> That's not very reassuring, you're saying the universe exists for the same
> reason that Santa Claus exists.

No, I'm grounding the term "self-justifying" after getting a lot of
sophistry-oid philosophical flack and "proofs" that the term is
meaningless. I don't think that the First Cause works that way.

> If evolution doesn't
> like it evolution can lump it.
I'm getting tired of repeating this: if you look at Algernon's Law I
devoted an entire section to saying exactly the same thing.

> To repeat, what's the difference between cognitive and computational
> causality?
For the last time, the difference between a computer and an expert
system - say MYCIN - devoted to figuring out WHY a patient shows some
particular symptoms. One describes a generic computer, the other a
particular set of programs.

For the rest of your philosophical questions, ask me again in 6 months.

-- 
         sentience@pobox.com      Eliezer S. Yudkowsky
          http://tezcat.com/~eliezer/singularity.html
           http://tezcat.com/~eliezer/algernon.html
Disclaimer:  Unless otherwise specified, I'm not telling you
everything I know.