Summa technologiae

[peskanov]

OK, I want You to tell me how is it that I know that I am, that I'm talking with You about creating something like us, that I'm talking with You about how is it possible that we are talking. Tell me also, how is it, that I can "feel" what is the right answer for things I have no knowledge about.

Please note that you are the one negating everything, including what is evident.
You have said, several times, that we know NOTHING about the human mind...However I am sure you know all these things about the mind:

- You know you posses memory: the hability to recreate past moments of your life with images and sensations, old learned concepts, faces, songs...
- You know your memory is falible. You know sometimes your records don't fit the evidence. You know your memory sometimes degrades with time.
- You now learning requires repetition to achieve excellence.
- You know your speed learning certain habilities is different from other individuals.
- You know you can create spoken discurses in your mind.
- You know you have the hability to re-create images in your mind.
- You know your perception of time is not always the same.
- You know most habilities of your mind suffer when you are tired or sleepy.
- You know you lose your awareness when going to sleep, and recover it partially while dreaming.
- You know you sometimes do small actions by reasons you are not fully aware of, "inconscient" actions.
- You know certain situations usually produce associated feelings. Like fear in the darkness, etc...

...and a very large list of all the things everybody knows about their own mind.

Now tell me if you know or not all these things about your mind.
Does all your knowledge about your mind amount to NOTHING or not?

Don't you feel most of those knowledges about your mind suggest the existence of underlying causes or mechanisms?
And about about neuroscientist? Do you accept they know more about the human mind than you?

Tell me also, how is it, that I can make a painting with few squares and some people will like it and others don't.

Are you asking why different mind develop different aesthetic tastes? I don't know, but I could elaborate thousands of hypothesis.
Different persons develop different tastes pending on multitude of external and internal factors, I don't see anything special here. What's your own answer to this question? If you say "free will", this will not explain nothing, while we know there probably exist real answers.

I'm not saying You don't have a free will. I just wonder, how is it that You have it. Meaning, if I can make decisions, how is it possible, according to our phisical knowledge? (if you've explained it in Your answer I'm sorry that I didn't understand it, my English is quite bad

Yes I did, but I will try again.
What I say is the "free will" is a) or b) or c)

a) In an deterministic universe, impossible but uninteresting and irrelevant to AI discussions.
b) In an deterministic universe, possible and a property of all superior animals and advanced AI programs.
c) In a partially non-deterministic universe, possible but uninteresting and irrelevant to AI discussions.

To choose your answer you must consider if you believe the universe to be deterministic or not, and what's your definition of an entity being "free".

[Terminus]

Back to Neural Networks, peskanov, thanks for the links. I'll see it through.
Neural Networks  may be not interesting for a mathematician, but the learning abilities are, of couse, what's precious, so I'll stop swaggering and let's get back to AI.
Aha, one more thing. You say, that Turing machine is also simple, but makes impressive things possible. I am, however, far from admiring Turing machines, they are (mathematically trival, and essentially) nothing more than a scheme of a calculator with memory, which is obvious. Calculators are, on the other hand, all we need...  It's no point to quarell about what's complex and impressive, however, let us not stray out of the AI topic.

As for it (AI), I am wondering, what abilities of the human brain should be programmed as an overriding procedures. (I am not referring to how it will be done, but to what should be done.) As for now, we've talked about the ability to collect information (recognizing characters, etc.).
I personally think, that one of crucial ideas (of future AI) should also be the ability to thing (compute) in an abstract way. That is, in the opinion of many, what differs people from animals. You have to admit, peskanov that even if it is true, that our brains are  complex computers, than it is also apparent, that no other animals express the ability to think abstractly in our way.
Abstract thinking of a philosopher, or scientist, or whoever, is an ability to find regularity in something, and to use the knowledge of that regularity and apply it somewhere else.

How, gentelmen, would that be implemented in AI? What do You think?

(I have no idea, of course...).
Cheers

(Ps. peskanov pardon for asking, but I won't take it anymore  :  What, if I may ask, is Your speciality? Are You a programmer?  Apologies for asking only You, but me, Deckard, and dzi know eachother from Polish section, and I know that Deckard is a hard-core computer scientist, and dzi is whatever-You-wish-him-to-be  . )

[dzi]

Please note that you are the one negating everything, including what is evident.
You have said, several times, that we know NOTHING about the human mind...However I am sure you know all these things about the mind:

- You know you posses memory: the hability to recreate past moments of your life with images and sensations, old learned concepts, faces, songs...
- You know your memory is falible. You know sometimes your records don't fit the evidence. You know your memory sometimes degrades with time.
- You now learning requires repetition to achieve excellence.
- You know your speed learning certain habilities is different from other individuals.
- You know you can create spoken discurses in your mind.
- You know you have the hability to re-create images in your mind.
- You know your perception of time is not always the same.
- You know most habilities of your mind suffer when you are tired or sleepy.
- You know you lose your awareness when going to sleep, and recover it partially while dreaming.
- You know you sometimes do small actions by reasons you are not fully aware of, "inconscient" actions.
- You know certain situations usually produce associated feelings. Like fear in the darkness, etc...

...and a very large list of all the things everybody knows about their own mind.

I'll repeat. We know what our minds are able to do, we don't have an idea [size=24]HOW[/size] it happens. And the question about AI is HOW to make it, not what is it going to be.

Now tell me if you know or not all these things about your mind.
Does all your knowledge about your mind amount to NOTHING or not?

Don't you feel most of those knowledges about your mind suggest the existence of underlying causes or mechanisms?

Yes, that's obvious they suggest because everything is a mechanism, but again, we don't know what the mechanism is.

And about about neuroscientist? Do you accept they know more about the human mind than you?

They know how our brains are built (a bit), they have no idea why they think.

Are you asking why different mind develop different aesthetic tastes? I don't know, but I could elaborate thousands of hypothesis.

It's not a problem to make hypothesis, the question is if it has any sense.

Different persons develop different tastes pending on multitude of external and internal factors, I don't see anything special here. What's your own answer to this question?

My own answer is I DON'T KNOW, and I repeat it all the time here

If you say "free will", this will not explain nothing, while we know there probably exist real answers.
Yes I did, but I will try again.
What I say is the "free will" is a) or b) or c)

a) In an deterministic universe, impossible but uninteresting and irrelevant to AI discussions.
b) In an deterministic universe, possible and a property of all superior animals and advanced AI programs.
c) In a partially non-deterministic universe, possible but uninteresting and irrelevant to AI discussions.

What I'm saying is that according to our phisics our universe is deterministic (so points a and b). My question is, how is it possible to make choices in such universe? Because now we think that we make choices, and that's what we want to implement in AI, we just (again) don't know how because of our phisical knowledge.

To choose your answer you must consider if you believe the universe to be deterministic or not, and what's your definition of an entity being "free".

I believe in what phisics say and that's my problem, because according to that I don't make choices.

How, gentelmen, would that be implemented in AI? What do You think?

Yeah that's my question basically too...

(Ps. peskanov pardon for asking, but I won't take it anymore  :  What, if I may ask, is Your speciality? Are You a programmer?  Apologies for asking only You, but me, Deckard, and dzi know eachother from Polish section, and I know that Deckard is a hard-core computer scientist, and dzi is whatever-You-wish-him-to-be  . )

Yes, I'm quite flexible   But they usually say that I'm a (soft-core) computer scientist (software developer to be more specific)

[Deckert]

To peskanov, about this materialist and non-materialist attitudes to AI.
I believe you asked that question, 'coz our countries have somethings in common.  Spain and Poland are situated on the opposite edges of Europe. They are both quite big coutries. Some time ago you were considered to be a very catholic country. It has changed lately. Now, Poland, on the other hand, is at present thought to be the most catholic country in eastern Europe.
So, I understand why you are interested in our point of view about the AI. Unfortunatelly I can't answer that question, 'coz AI, imo is a scientific problem not related with belief. Of course, from the philosopical point of view it is quite related, but common people have no bright idea about it. In Poland more known problems (also linked somehow with science - in fact with medicine) are euthansia and abortion. And here statistics could say something.

I can only say what we think about AI on this forum. But I will state now only my point of view. So I think I have non-materialistic attitude:

1. Neuroscientists have some partial knowledge on how our brains are built. They make discoveries on how we can see, smell, touch etc... but they have still no idea on how we think. The question is, will they ever discover it?
2. Omitting the above question, I think the AI can be  discovered before we get knowledge on how we think (if ever). It's quite possible. I've been saying that quite often, that I think the AI would be a different kind of intelligence. Different to ours. The process of thinking might go in the different way.

As dzi wrote, we know nothing about AI, and that's why it's so funny to talk about it. We all have some fears and hopes.

So, how the process of abstract thinking could be implemented into the AI? I don't know. I might be a programistic trick of some sort...
Do you remember the story with one of the greates computer games ever written? John Carmack (ID Software) wrote Doom (gee, how many dark nights I spent playing it?). That was the first game that introduced the 3D World into the computer entertainment industry. Of course, we know now, that it was just a programistic trick, 'coz no common PC's were able, at that time to display a real 3D action. Game developers and also hardware engineers from accross the world were asking themselves a question, how it was possible to display such dynamic things on the typical 286 or 386 processor? As I said, it was just a trick. In fact everything was 2-dimensional.

[peskanov]

Dzi, Terminus:
I have the feeling that you are backing what is called, in philosophy, an argument to ignorance ("argumentum ad ignorantiam")
http://skepdic.com/ignorance.html

You claim that, as we ignore mind inner workings, machines smarter that us can not exist. Where is the relation between these two propositions? There is none!
Instead of discussing in circles, I propose you two write your argument more formally. Can you fill the gap?
1.- The inner workings of the human mind are unknown
2.- ...
(add your premises and arguments here, so they lead to the conclusion)
Conclusion: no machine more intelligent than a human mind can exist.

I have showed you a good deal of evidence which points to an afirmative prediction of strong AI. Now is your turn, convince me that strong AI is impossible.

I am going to write here my own prediction more formally, so you can see clearly my argument:
1.- The human brain is an discrete information-processing device
2.- The human mind is an emergent phenomenon from the brain
3.- Different configurations of the brain produce diferent intellectual capacities of the mind.
4.- Evolution shows a time-progressing grow of intelligence in the animal kingdom.
5.- Progresive apparition of superior intellects occurs inside mankind, until today.
6.- (deducted from 4 and 5) Intelligence is a growing quality (with no limit known).
7.- A computer is a discrete information processing device
8.- A computer can be build which greatly surpass the information processing capacity of the human brain.
Conclusion (from 1,2,6,7 and 8 ) : A computer can surpass human intellect.

That's the meat of my argument. I think I can defend each one of these points.
Now is your turn to explain your argument.

[peskanov]

Terminus,
I would like to add one link more:
http://www.brainatlas.org/

This is the effort financed by Paul Allen to create a complete, detailed map of the human brain.

As for it (AI), I am wondering, what abilities of the human brain should be programmed as an overriding procedures. (I am not referring to how it will be done, but to what should be done.) As for now, we've talked about the ability to collect information (recognizing characters, etc.).

Yes, I have pressed more in analysis, because NN more simple and common uses are analysis processes.
However synthesis of information is also acomplished with NN.

 I personally think, that one of crucial ideas (of future AI) should also be the ability to thing (compute) in an abstract way. That is, in the opinion of many, what differs people from animals. You have to admit, peskanov that even if it is true, that our brains are  complex computers, than it is also apparent, that no other animals express the ability to think abstractly in our way.  

Should I? The seeds of abstraction seems to be in the animals also...
For me, the concept of number is the supreme abstraction of the human mind, and probably the driving force in our capacity for abstraction. The number is not directly related to any object, action or sensation of the real world.
However there exist evidence that certain innate hability for numbers is already hardwired in our brain as consequence of evolution. It seems we use an special part of out brain to count until three, and it seems this counting hability is also present in some superior animals.

http://www.apa.org/monitor/apr99/math.html

For you abstract thinking is radical departure from the animal kingdom, but for me is a question of degree. An evolutive hability, which probably developed and grew with the aparition of the human languages.
Sadly, there no other human species alive today to compare our respective capacity for abstraction.

How, gentelmen, would that be implemented in AI? What do You think?  

I have defended reaching artifical human thinking by imitation of existent biology. This method does not require our understading of it's mechanism, only mere replication.
...you don't have to understand how Linux works to copy a CD containing it.
After acomplishing that, you can try to augment it's capacities through try-and error, doing methodical architecture changes, like in the genetic algorythms (for example).

Ps. peskanov pardon for asking, but I won't take it anymore   :  What, if I may ask, is Your speciality? Are You a programmer?  Apologies for asking only You, but me, Deckard, and dzi know eachother from Polish section, and I know that Deckard is a hard-core computer scientist, and dzi is whatever-You-wish-him-to-be

Ok, but you should not use the expression "I won't take it anymore". In English it's used in violent situations (google it for checking).
I am a profesional videogames programmer.
I studied a short universitary course of 3 years, (in a very pragmatic, work-oriented school). There, I also studied expert sytems and prolog, but very lightly, and several algorythms and techniques used commonly in AI (like recursion or path finding).
I have programmed the AI for a few commercial videogames, but this kind of AI is usually quite simple. Usually I program in the graphics part of the games, the 3D engine, not in the AI part.
I learned about NN reading some IEEE transactions from one of my brothers who studied telecommunications. I became fascinated with them and I usually read about the matter regularly and keep with the news from time to time.
Right now I am working in the preproduction of a fighting game for ps2, and I am planning to try NN in the AI for the first time in my career. I want to see if I will able to train some NN using the corpus of data produced by real persons playing the game. If I fail I will have to program it in the classical way

BTW, I also pertain to a very small cultural movement called "demoscene", which basically consist in creating real time computer graphics presentations, programmed in C and/or assembler. I mention it because is quite popular in Poland and maybe you know it.

PD: I don't claim to be an scientis of the AI field, just a person interested in the matter an who works in it from time to time.

[peskanov]

dzi,

I'll repeat. We know what our minds are able to do, we don't have an idea HOW it happens. And the question about AI is HOW to make it, not what is it
going to be.

Ah, but you know also a lot of HOWs. Recall any conscient decission you took recently. I am sure you will be able to recall a big part of your mental processes.
This is very different from knowing NOTHING about how you mind works.

Yes, that's obvious they suggest because everything is a mechanism, but again, we don't know what the mechanism is.

If you accept it could be a mechanism, why don't you accept the trivial extrapolation that a most powerful mechanism could exist?

What I'm saying is that according to our phisics our universe is deterministic (so points a and b). My question is, how is it possible to make choices in such universe? Because now we think that we make choices, and that's what we want to implement in AI, we just (again) don't know how because of our phisical knowledge.

Making choices is trivial. You weight the relevant factors of the decission and reach a result. Computers do it all time. A person is only partially aware of this proccess, but it happens anyway at neural level.
This is point b), which means we operate in a similar fashion than computers.
Can you honestly say your decissions are not the result of a bunch of factors (like your memories or feelings in the decission moment)?

I believe in what phisics say and that's my problem, because according to that I don't make choices.

Yes you do, and computers do it also. I defy you to demonstrate computers don't make decissions.

[peskanov]

Deckard,

I believe you asked that question, 'coz our countries have somethings in common.  Spain and Poland are situated on the opposite edges of Europe. They are both quite big coutries. Some time ago you were considered to be a very catholic country. It has changed lately. Now, Poland, on the other hand, is at present thought to be the most catholic country in eastern Europe.

Yes, that's my understading. In west Europe, I think only Ireland has a similar profile.

So, I understand why you are interested in our point of view about the AI. Unfortunatelly I can't answer that question, 'coz AI, imo is a scientific problem not related with belief.

I don't know about Poland, but I was teached, in Catholic doctrine, that the intelligence of humans separate us from animals, and that intelligence comes from then human soul, which is god-given and clearly non-physical. From the pov of my old christian teachers, strong AI is a phantasy or an aberration.

But to be fair, I asked because I am interested on the views of Stanislaw Lem readers. I am very very surprised to find that Lem readers and followers are so skeptical of both strong AI and materialism...A big surprise, really.

1. Neuroscientists have some partial knowledge on how our brains are built. They make discoveries on how we can see, smell, touch etc... but they have still no idea on how we think. The question is, will they ever discover it?

Here is the meat of my argument.
We do NOT need to understand it, to make an artificial replica!
Current programmers using NN solve problems without knowing how the NN solves them!
Read carefully the hipocampus prosthesis link I posted; they built a funcional part of the brain, but they don't have any clue about what the electric signals mean.
The key is that we can correclty replicate this clockwork machine without knowing how it really works, or more exactly, what it's dynamics really MEANS.

Do you remember the story with one of the greates computer games ever written? John Carmack (ID Software) wrote Doom (gee, how many dark nights I spent playing it?). That was the first game that introduced the 3D World into the computer entertainment industry. Of course, we know now, that it was just a programistic trick, 'coz no common PC's were able, at that time to display a real 3D action. Game developers and also hardware engineers from accross the world were asking themselves a question, how it was possible to display such dynamic things on the typical 286 or 386 processor? As I said, it was just a trick. In fact everything was 2-dimensional.

Well, we used to call it 2 and half dimensions. It's 3d but the camera only has one degree of freedom because walls has to remain vertical and grounds horizontal...I spent a some time in 1995 trying to replicate this 3d engine.

I understand your analogy, but it does not affect my pov. In this case, I would simply claim that we can copy this software, and then, progresively toy with it to change it's posibilities.

BTW, do you also program videogames?

[Deckert]

Peskanov!
Great job on answering our posts.
I don't have the time at the moment to read everything but I wanted to say that I'm glad to have here a forum memeber with such a great programming experience.

You wrote:

BTW, I also pertain to a very small cultural movement called "demoscene",

Of course, demoscene is still active here in Poland. I'm still a great fan of C64 and Amiga. I still posses C64 (a few models), Timex 2048, and Amiga 500 and 600 with a lot of stuff. I just have to say that I LOVE IT!
Obviously, it's not popular any more, but yet there are some freeks like me, who still enjoy it. Now demoscene goes around demos and intros for PC, and sometimes I download them to look at what people want to show.

Well, we used to call it 2 and half dimensions.

Yes, of course. You used a correct description of that technique. I haven't looked at the source code but I read a lot about it, and participated in some level designs. It was clear to me, just by using the editor, that this is just a 2,5D.

BTW, do you also program videogames?

Nope. But it has always been my big dream.

To the rest of your posts I will try to answer later - now I go to the cinema!

CU
Deck

[dzi]

You claim that, as we ignore mind inner workings, machines smarter that us can not exist. Where is the relation between these two propositions? There is none!

And where did I say that it can't exist?

Instead of discussing in circles, I propose you two write your argument more formally. Can you fill the gap?
1.- The inner workings of the human mind are unknown
2.- ...
(add your premises and arguments here, so they lead to the conclusion)
Conclusion: no machine more intelligent than a human mind can exist.

The argument You states is enough for me, just the conclusion is wrong. My conclusion would be: no intelligent machine is possible to be made now.

I have showed you a good deal of evidence which points to an afirmative prediction of strong AI. Now is your turn, convince me that strong AI is impossible.

I won't, because I have no idea if it's true (as I said).

I am going to write here my own prediction more formally, so you can see clearly my argument:
1.- The human brain is an discrete information-processing device
2.- The human mind is an emergent phenomenon from the brain
3.- Different configurations of the brain produce diferent intellectual capacities of the mind.
4.- Evolution shows a time-progressing grow of intelligence in the animal kingdom.
5.- Progresive apparition of superior intellects occurs inside mankind, until today.
6.- (deducted from 4 and 5) Intelligence is a growing quality (with no limit known).
7.- A computer is a discrete information processing device
8.- A computer can be build which greatly surpass the information processing capacity of the human brain.
Conclusion (from 1,2,6,7 and 8 ) : A computer can surpass human intellect.

As for 1, 2 and 4 I'm not sure if it's true for example. How can You prove it?

That's the meat of my argument. I think I can defend each one of these points.
Now is your turn to explain your argument.

Mine is:
We don't know how our intelligence is, we are even having problems with defining what is an intelligence. That's why the only way to create an intelligence is to copy it, meaning to build an artificial brain. We are no capable to do it neither. We have to wait. End of discussion for me

[dzi]

dzi,
Ah, but you know also a lot of HOWs. Recall any conscient decission you took recently. I am sure you will be able to recall a big part of your mental processes.

Would You name an expert system an intelligence? It seems You would...
What intrests us in our intelligence is our creativity, that big it can create god, or think how could the universe look like before it started. What intrests us is why we love and why we hate. That's the intelligence I'm talking about.
It's not a problem to make a machine making logical conclusions. We actually do it, it's called "expert system", not intelligence.

This is very different from knowing NOTHING about how you mind works.
If you accept it could be a mechanism, why don't you accept the trivial extrapolation that a most powerful mechanism could exist?

OK, sorry, I'm actually not sure if it's a mechanism...

Making choices is trivial. You weight the relevant factors of the decission and reach a result. Computers do it all time. A person is only partially aware of this proccess, but it happens anyway at neural level.
This is point b), which means we operate in a similar fashion than computers.
Can you honestly say your decissions are not the result of a bunch of factors (like your memories or feelings in the decission moment)?
Yes you do, and computers do it also. I defy you to demonstrate computers don't make decissions.

I'll try to explain it once more.
Our phisics says, that if we have a group of atoms it is possible to predict the next state of the system, meaning, where each atom is going to move.
Our brain is made of atoms. Our thinking is a process of transporting electrons.
So if You look at Your brain at a quantum level, it means, it's already known how is it going to look like next. It means, that You can't think what You want because it's already "decided" what You'll thing (meaning it's known where each of electrons in Your brain will move so it can't cause two ways of thinking).
You don't have to convince me that I make decisions, I know that, You know that, and everyone knows that. What's the conclusion of it?
The conclusion is that our brain doesn't work how our phisics tells him to work. That means our phisics is wrong. And that means we can't get theoretically known how our brain works. And that means we can't build a brain (unless we somehow copy it without understanding).

[Deckert]

Peskanov,

PD: I don't claim to be an scientis of the AI field, just a person interested in the matter an who works in it from time to time.

You know that practical life is much different from theory. That's why it's so good to have down here someone with practical experience.

Peskanov, just a personal question? Why you keep using the word hability instead of just ability? ;-)

Yes, that's my understading. In west Europe, I think only Ireland has a similar profile.

This is exactly what we know down here in Poland.

But to be fair, I asked because I am interested on the views of Stanislaw Lem readers. I am very very surprised to find that Lem readers and followers are so skeptical of both strong AI and materialism...A big surprise, really.

Hey, I just pictured my point of view. I have a mistical attitude to life, that's why. Maybe Terminus and dzi will also make a statement in this matter.

We do NOT need to understand it, to make an artificial replica!

But this is exactly what I said!
In this case I will clarify my point of view once again. On one hand we have neuroscientists which surgically examine brain to detect the areas responsible for controlling specific reactions and so on. Many people think that it can lead us, in the long run, to discovery of how we think. I believe it's not true.
On the other hand we have technical staff consisted of scientists, engineers and designers gathered in one purpose - to build the AI. And I think this is the right way, which will finally give us the AI. Of course I don't exclude information exchange between neuroscientists and technicians.
However, because AI will be a technical solution, this kind of intelligence will run in a different way to the biologically originated inteligence. Why?
We, humans, have "built-in" sensors which give us the ability to see, touch, smell, feel pain etc... We learn much thanks to that sensors. Computer intelligence is not outfitted with such capabilities although people do a great deal of effort to create electronic substitutions of our biological sensors. But again, I believe AI can be created without this sensors. It will be dependant on the level of abstraction describing our world.

Read carefully the hipocampus prosthesis link I posted; they built a funcional part of the brain, but they don't have any clue about what the electric signals mean.

Obviously, I will read it. Thanks for all these links.

I understand your analogy, but it does not affect my pov. In this case, I would simply claim that we can copy this software, and then, progresively toy with it to change it's posibilities.

Just as you said, it was an analogy, nothing more.

[Terminus]

Few things.
First, I know english too well; I wanted to add smileys to my 'i cant take it anymore' but must have forgotten to.
Second, stick this argumentum ad ignorantiam...
Have You seen the episode of south park about underpant gnomes? They were a bunch of small creatures, who had an undergound HQ, where they collected underpants stolen from the town's people. They did it all, to follow their working plan, which follows:

1. Collect underpants.
2. ...?
3. World domination.

Ingenious AI scientist, are at the point 1.

How can You say that you don't need to understand something, to create a working copy of it? That's the argumment of ignorance.

It's a brutally simple matter. We thing, that there is a stage in point 2. which eiher is very difficuld to overcome, or will take years to break by patient programming, or won't be defeated at all; whereas You suggest that it is just a matter of time.

You are not able to convince us, as well we aren't able to convince You. It's the same vacuum of arguments on the both sides.

As for the scene, I took part as a multichannel composer, I was a great fan of Pulse group, nowadays I am not that familiar with what happens there...

[Deckert]

As for the scene, I took part as a multichannel composer, I was a great fan of Pulse group, nowadays I am not that familiar with what happens there...

The scene is active, as I wrote, but it's far from the activity it had in the past. That's rather obvious, who still wants to type assembler code nowadays?  

[dzi]

As for the scene, I took part as a multichannel composer, I was a great fan of Pulse group, nowadays I am not that familiar with what happens there...

Yeah, Pulse was good

Peskanov,
Hey, I just pictured my point of view. I have a mistical attitude to life, that's why. Maybe Terminus and dzi will also make a statement in this matter.

I'm not sure if seeing me as a typical Lem reader is a good thing to do Don't do it Peskanov

Hey I just realised some horrible (at least for me) thing... When we make AI we will "build" it's world at mathematics. After some time when AIs are making theories for us and everything a problem (for me) will show up. A problem because theories made by AI will be made on the world "implemented" to them. And taking the world of philosophy by the world of science will be even stronger. Hopefully we'll still use our brains and remember that our senses is not everything we "see" with...
It's kinda similar to the concept made in Summa that sais we can make an artifical (virtual) world based on mathematics and "move" into it to be sure the world we see is "mathematical".