Are AI models narrowly creative?
#4722·Tyler MillsOP, 17 days agoThe definition of fitness that rendered Move 37 the best choice originated outside the system.
The definition of fitness for DNA also originated outside it, so this doesn't in itself suggest the system isn't actually creating new knowledge.
Does not understand explanatory knowledge seems like a better criterion
Understanding explanatory knowledge seems like a better criterion
#4781·Dirk Meulenbelt, 8 days agoA random number generator does not create explanatory knowledge.
Does not understand explanatory knowledge seems like a better criterion
#4694·Tyler MillsOP revised 20 days agoBy this standard, a random number generator has universal creativity as well, and is therefore a person. So there must be a standard for personhood other than: able to generate any possible explanation. Such as: can do that tractably.
A random number generator does not create explanatory knowledge.
By the latter standard, neither nature nor random number generators are people, which is sensible; nor can nature create any given possible knowledge tractably -- this is true because the fact that all possible knowledge exists is only by way of the multiverse, which is a process that cannot be simulated in its entirety, even by a quantum computer, never mind tractability.
By the latter standard, neither nature nor random number generators are people, which is sensible; nor can nature create any given possible knowledge tractably -- this is true because the fact that all possible knowledge exists is only by way of the multiverse, which is a process that cannot be simulated in its entirety, even by a quantum computer.
#4774·Tyler MillsOP, 9 days agoAn alternative criterion for personhood is speed: a person is a program that can synthesize any explanation in less than the lifetime of the universe, say.
This wrongly implies speed is a property of programs, but it's a property of hardware.
#4774·Tyler MillsOP, 9 days agoAn alternative criterion for personhood is speed: a person is a program that can synthesize any explanation in less than the lifetime of the universe, say.
This is a bad criterion because then random program generators are sometimes people.
#4694·Tyler MillsOP revised 20 days agoBy this standard, a random number generator has universal creativity as well, and is therefore a person. So there must be a standard for personhood other than: able to generate any possible explanation. Such as: can do that tractably.
An alternative criterion for personhood is speed: a person is a program that can synthesize any explanation in less than the lifetime of the universe, say.
#4684·Tyler MillsOP, 20 days agoSince evolution created genetic knowledge from nothing, it can be said to have the same "narrow creativity" as AI. The confusion over whether AI "is creative" can be resolved by saying that it is, but only narrowly (like evolution), and that the creativity defining people is universal, not limited to any domain. AI creates knowledge in domains it was designed for; AGI can create knowledge in all possible domains, each of which it designs itself.
Criticized per #4718: AIs are not "narrowly creative"; there is only creativity in the binary, universal sense, per Deutsch.
#4718·Tyler MillsOP, 17 days agoMove 37 was not new knowledge. It was the winning choice in that situation before the AI ever existed, because it was deducible from the game's rules and the current board state. It was implicit knowledge, already contained in the system at that time. AlphaGo made it explicit, by finding it, like a search engine, but did not create it. If you calculate the trillionth digit of pi, you haven't created new knowledge, at least not in any sense we should mean. You have simply revealed a value that was already fixed by a definition.
The fact that Move 37 wasn't explicitly in the training data or the programmers is irrelevant to its status as knowledge. This is true for pi, and for all content created by AI at the time of this writing.
The definition of fitness that rendered Move 37 the best choice originated outside the system.
#4720·Tyler MillsOP, 17 days agoIf the human made Move 37 for the same reason as AlphaGo, it would not be creative. Such moves are creative when humans make them because they are not deducing them (they can't due to practical limitations). If something can be deduced, it is not creative. Creativity is the conjecture of a new structure which is not derivable/deducible/implicit via existing rules of inference. All AI-generated art is implicit in the training data and model design in the same sense, so is not being made via creativity.
This highlights the core mystery of AGI/creativity: if it is the creation of something which cannot be deduced from existing rules (yet is still helpful, hard-to-vary, knowledge-bearing, etc.), how can it be programmed? In a sense it cannot, as Deutsch writes: "...what distinguishes human brains from all other physical systems is qualitatively different from all other functionalities, and cannot be specified in the way that all other attributes of computer programs can be. It cannot be programmed by any of the techniques that suffice for writing any other type of program." [https://aeon.co/essays/how-close-are-we-to-creating-artificial-intelligence]
#4719·Tyler MillsOP, 17 days agoIf there had been no AlphaGo and no Move 37, and a human had made that move, as they have similar moves, it would no doubt be called creative genius (as similar moves have). Isn't the above a double standard?
If the human made Move 37 for the same reason as AlphaGo, it would not be creative. Such moves are creative when humans make them because they are not deducing them (they can't due to practical limitations). If something can be deduced, it is not creative. Creativity is the conjecture of a new structure which is not derivable/deducible/implicit via existing rules of inference. All AI-generated art is implicit in the training data and model design in the same sense, so is not being made via creativity.
#4718·Tyler MillsOP, 17 days agoMove 37 was not new knowledge. It was the winning choice in that situation before the AI ever existed, because it was deducible from the game's rules and the current board state. It was implicit knowledge, already contained in the system at that time. AlphaGo made it explicit, by finding it, like a search engine, but did not create it. If you calculate the trillionth digit of pi, you haven't created new knowledge, at least not in any sense we should mean. You have simply revealed a value that was already fixed by a definition.
The fact that Move 37 wasn't explicitly in the training data or the programmers is irrelevant to its status as knowledge. This is true for pi, and for all content created by AI at the time of this writing.
If there had been no AlphaGo and no Move 37, and a human had made that move, as they have similar moves, it would no doubt be called creative genius (as similar moves have). Isn't the above a double standard?
#4683·Tyler MillsOP, 20 days agoAIs have created output that is not only novel, but seems to constitute new knowledge (resilient information), such as the famous Move 37 from AlphaGo. That is new knowledge because the move was not present in the training data explicitly, nor did the designers construct it.
Move 37 was not new knowledge. It was the winning choice in that situation before the AI ever existed, because it was deducible from the game's rules and the current board state. It was implicit knowledge, already contained in the system at that time. AlphaGo made it explicit, by finding it, like a search engine, but did not create it. If you calculate the trillionth digit of pi, you haven't created new knowledge, at least not in any sense we should mean. You have simply revealed a value that was already fixed by a definition.
The fact that Move 37 wasn't explicitly in the training data or the programmers is irrelevant to its status as knowledge. This is true for pi, and for all content created by AI at the time of this writing.
Move 37 was not explicitly present in the training data, nor designed by the programmers, and is extremely hard to vary (Deutsch's criterion for good explanations). Was the move present implicitly in the design of the system and/or the training data? Or inexplicitly? Does either of these mean the discovery of the move was non-creative?
Move 37 was not explicitly present in the training data, nor designed by the programmers, and is extremely hard to vary (Deutsch's criterion for good explanations). Was the move present implicitly in the design of the system and/or the training data? Or inexplicitly? Do either of these mean the discovery of the move was non-creative?
#4686·Edwin de Wit, 20 days agoThis seems to me to be the same distinction that Deutsch and others have made between the genetic evolution we can simulate through evolutionary algorithms and the kind we actually observe in nature. I think it would be helpful to investigate evolutionary algorithms a bit further if you want to develop a clear distinction. This is how I describe it in my book:
There are several mechanisms that genes use to create variants, including sex, mutation, gene flow, and genetic drift, all of which appear to introduce change randomly. But we now know it cannot be entirely random. Something more is shaping what gets trialed, because when we model and simulate evolution using random changes, we never see the sort of novelties that arose in nature. We see optimization. We see exploitation. We see organisms become better at using resources they already use. But we never see a genuinely new use of a resource emerge. A fin may become better at swimming, but it does not become a limb. A metabolism may become more efficient, but it does not open up an entirely new biological pathway. And yet the natural world is full of exactly such extraordinary adaptations.
Be sure to mention the title of your book so others can look it up :)
#4694·Tyler MillsOP revised 20 days agoBy this standard, a random number generator has universal creativity as well, and is therefore a person. So there must be a standard for personhood other than: able to generate any possible explanation. Such as: can do that tractably.
By the latter standard, neither nature nor random number generators are people, which is sensible; nor can nature create any given possible knowledge tractably -- this is true because the fact that all possible knowledge exists is only by way of the multiverse, which is a process that cannot be simulated in its entirety, even by a quantum computer, never mind tractability.
By this standard, a random number generator has universal creativity as well, and is therefore a person. So there must be a standard for personhood other than: able to generate any possible explanation. Such as: can do that tractably.
By this standard, a random number generator has universal creativity as well, and is therefore a person. So there must be a standard for personhood other than: able to generate any possible explanation. Such as: can do that tractably.
By this standard, a random number generator has universal creativity as well, and is therefore a person. So there must be standard for personhood other than: able to generate any possible explanation. Such as: can do that tractably.
By this standard, a random number generator has universal creativity as well, and is therefore a person. So there must be a standard for personhood other than: able to generate any possible explanation. Such as: can do that tractably.
#4690·Tyler MillsOP, 20 days agoNature does have universal creativity; it can generate any possible knowledge. And all possible knowledge exists somewhere in reality.
By this standard, a random number generator has universal creativity as well, and is therefore a person. So there must be standard for personhood other than: able to generate any possible explanation. Such as: can do that tractably.
#4689·Tyler MillsOP, 20 days agoBut nature created genetic knowledge from nothing. So this is an example of something which does not have universal creativity which created knowledge ex nihilo.
Nature does have universal creativity; it can generate any possible knowledge. And all possible knowledge exists somewhere in reality.
#4688·Tyler MillsOP, 20 days agoThis also admits of the distinction between AI and AGI (and "universal creativity") as being whether the system is capable of creating knowledge ex nihilo, as argued by Deutsch. Only universal creativity could create knowledge from nothing. Bounded creativity must start with something.
But nature created genetic knowledge from nothing. So this is an example of something which does not have universal creativity which created knowledge ex nihilo.
#4684·Tyler MillsOP, 20 days agoSince evolution created genetic knowledge from nothing, it can be said to have the same "narrow creativity" as AI. The confusion over whether AI "is creative" can be resolved by saying that it is, but only narrowly (like evolution), and that the creativity defining people is universal, not limited to any domain. AI creates knowledge in domains it was designed for; AGI can create knowledge in all possible domains, each of which it designs itself.
This also admits of the distinction between AI and AGI (and "universal creativity") as being whether the system is capable of creating knowledge ex nihilo, as argued by Deutsch. Only universal creativity could create knowledge from nothing. Bounded creativity must start with something.
#4686·Edwin de Wit, 20 days agoThis seems to me to be the same distinction that Deutsch and others have made between the genetic evolution we can simulate through evolutionary algorithms and the kind we actually observe in nature. I think it would be helpful to investigate evolutionary algorithms a bit further if you want to develop a clear distinction. This is how I describe it in my book:
There are several mechanisms that genes use to create variants, including sex, mutation, gene flow, and genetic drift, all of which appear to introduce change randomly. But we now know it cannot be entirely random. Something more is shaping what gets trialed, because when we model and simulate evolution using random changes, we never see the sort of novelties that arose in nature. We see optimization. We see exploitation. We see organisms become better at using resources they already use. But we never see a genuinely new use of a resource emerge. A fin may become better at swimming, but it does not become a limb. A metabolism may become more efficient, but it does not open up an entirely new biological pathway. And yet the natural world is full of exactly such extraordinary adaptations.
I keep returning to the notion of the space or domain in which simulated evolution so far operates in. It seems like we can say that current sim'd evolution can discover new knowledge via conjecture and criticism, but it is always bound by a domain predefined by fitness functions, automatic evaluators and so on, even if that domain itself contains many subdomains.
Then we can say that in nature, and in the minds of people, there is no externally defined space in which exploration is happening; the space is also evolving, also subject to criticism. I suspect this is part of how open-endedness comes about.
But the immediate question here was how to explain why AI is or is not "creative". Saying AIs are "narrowly creative" seems it could work, or saying they are creative within a fixed domain. The common intuition I think is that current AIs are "truly" creative, and I would say this is because the predefined domain (of LLMs, for instance) is gigantic, being sculpted by an internet-sized training corpus. But I suppose we should argue that "true creativity" means universal creativity.
I was curious if there are criticisms of the argument that current AI does legitimately create new knowledge.