aiguy: If you would be kind enough to tell me which thread would be appropriate for continuing the discussion, I'd be very happy to post my responses to Kornbelt, CJY, and others there"¦ particularly because CJY is explicitly asking for my responses!

Bradford: The discussion can be continued here.

Your original contention was that "intelligence" is not an explanation for anything and it is a scientifically vacuous notion. However if, as I have explained, intelligence is understood as foresight and the application of that foresight, then even if it is not a causal mechanism in itself, then foresight may still be a necessary condition to achieve certain results.

Here's the question. Can you drive yourself to someplace you've never been yet want to go without using any foresight (as I've previously defined it)? Do you personally need to be aware of which destination you are targeting and then use that awareness to plan a route that you will take *in the future* to arrive at your destination? Is foresight a necessary condition in this case? Is it a vacuous explanation to say that you used your foresight in order to plan your route? It's not the whole story, obviously, but it's definitely the beginning of an explanation which cites a very important necessary condition — foresight.

Or, how do you make money in business or investments? Answer: your success is proportionate to your foresight — what you are aware of that may happen in the future and how you align your present plan with that future information. This explanation is the foundation that can be built on in more detail, but it is definitely *not* vacuous.

Bradford's last comment "took part of the words out of my mouth."

I would like to add to that, though …

Zachriel:

CJYman's combined definition: Intelligence is the ability to apply {the awareness of a future target that one wishes to attain} to engineer a solution to accomplish a target.

"Awareness" you have defined in terms of consciousness, which is left undefined, while your use of "wish" implies teleology.

It is true that consciousness is difficult to define. However, awareness does sum it up pretty much. I have defined intelligence in terms of foresight and foresight in terms of awareness (or consciousness) of future targets that do not yet exist. Do you deny that you have the ability to be aware of future targets and then engineer a solution to accomplish them?

Awareness of future targets does exist. I will now provide evidence for that … I have designed a couple of mechanical logic gates in my spare time while thinking of a future target that did not yet exist (the mechanical logic gate itself).

If you want to get in to a definitions game in order to invalidate my point, then that's fine, but first let's do so with "gravity." I will begin by asking, "what is gravity?" Then, I will choose a word within your definition and continue to request that you define it … ad infinitum … until either you get fed up, in which case I will claim that you have no scientific argument for the existence of gravity, or until you arrive at a circular definition where you must rely on two different words or definitions to define each other. In that case, I will again claim that you have no argument for the existence of gravity, since you must rely upon a circular definition.

If you wish to define gravity as an equation, then I will define consciousness as an equation — E=h/t, which is part of Penrose and Hameroff's testable and falsifiable model of consciousness. As far as I understand, when the mass of coherent neurons is placed in this equation, human consciousness should occur at approx. 40 "moments" or "frames" per second. It just so happens that 40 hz. gamma synchrony is the best correlated measure within the human brain that we have of consciousness.

The only thing necessary for my argument to stand, is that awareness of future targets *does exist*. BTW: I haven't been able to continue on with my argument yet since aiguy hasn't answered my question while providing any evidence to back up his answer. However I have begun to back up my claim by citing my own ability to be aware of future targets that do not yet exist and then engineer a solution to accomplish those targets. Here's some more evidence. How many people use maps to plan a route to their destination? And this is where the word "wish" comes in. Yes, "wish" implies teleology. Have you ever "wished" for something to happen? Have you ever "wished" to arrive at a specific destination? Have you ever planned a route mentally before you got to your destination? If the answer is "yes," then foresight and teleology *do exist.*

Zachriel:

Computers can model the future and make decisions, but computers are not conscious. You are insisting that "true intelligence" requires consciousness. You have merely defined it so. With all your words, you have not presented an independent argument to that effect. Petitio principii.

NO, I have not "insisted" that "true" intelligence requires conscious awareness of future targets. I have defined it as such. It does exist as per my above examples. Artificial intelligence, however, is not conscious (IMO, that's why its "artificial"), and you agree. AI only consists of sufficiently and highly improbably organized logic gates which have the ability to acquire future targets, which is itself the future target that is programmed into the system, and thus AI requires a causal chain containing "true" intelligence which can actually engineer a solution is the present to accomplish a target in the future. Do you have any evidence to suggest otherwise or do you have any evidence that "true" conscious intelligence (as I've defined it) does *not* exist?

So, is foresight a necessary condition to see the fruition of an engineers blueprint or for the creation of an AI system?

Please provide evidence for your answer.

Also, I would still appreciate an answer to the following from aiguy:

In light of our discussion, do you still stand by your assertion that attempting to discover the effects of conscious intelligence (which does actually exist as per the engineer's ability to envision a target and then engineer a solution to accomplish the goal) is a non-scientific investigation that a scientist is justified in disavowing as pseudo-science?

Computers can model the future and make decisions, but computers are not conscious. You are insisting that "true intelligence" requires consciousness. You have merely defined it so. With all your words, you have not presented an independent argument to that effect.

Perhaps not but if I were to look for one I would start by noting that the causal genesis of the computer's capacity extends to conscious beings. Humans are a necessary part of a complete causal chain.

CJYman's combined definition: Intelligence is the ability to apply {the awareness of a future target that one wishes to attain} to engineer a solution to accomplish a target.

"Awareness" you have defined in terms of consciousness, which is left undefined, while your use of "wish" implies teleology.

CJYman: Is intelligence a necessary cause to see the fruition of an engineer's blueprint?

Having now defined intelligence as based on consciousness, no matter how many words you interject, your conclusion is predetermined.

CJYman: the difference between "true" intelligence and "artificial" intelligence is that the former possess foresight in the sense of envisioning (being aware of) a future goal whereas the latter can only provide solutions to targets that are given to it by conscious or "true" intelligence and can not form a conscious understanding of its target.

This paragraph emphasizes the circular manner of your terminology. Computers can model the future and make decisions, but computers are not conscious. You are insisting that "true intelligence" requires consciousness. You have merely defined it so. With all your words, you have not presented an independent argument to that effect. Petitio principii.

I've noticed that you are mangling what I'm saying and putting words into my mouth so as not to answer my questions. Also, you are leaving out integral parts of the discussion which provide context to my questions and when considered show how your "answers" are not answers at all. Honestly now, I'm reading what your saying right after you quote me and to me it seems like you're carrying on a conversation with someone else. Maybe it is my fault for not being clear. Here, I'll give it one more try.

myself: "If intelligence is summed up as "foresight and the ability to apply foresight to engineer a solution to accomplish a target," then is intelligence a necessary cause to see the fruition of an engineer's blueprint?"

aiguy:

You are saying that any time a solution is created for something we recognize as a problem, "intelligence" is the ability required to generate that solution. OK, sure, so this is true by definition.

In a sense that is true, but that's not what I asked now is it? I define foresight in the next sentence and you seem to have a problem with the inclusion of "awareness." Why is that?!?!? Foresight, as the awareness of a future as of yet non-existent target does exist and engineers *do* use this awareness in order to design their blueprints and then apply that design in their creation. Do you deny this? If so, why? Just because it may lend credibility to the science of Intelligent Design?

myself: "Foresight is the awareness of a future target that one wishes to attain."

Whoa! Awareness? Where did that come from? Computers can exhibit foresight"¦ do you think they are aware?

You wanted a more definite definition and I've given it to you. What do you mean "where did that come from." That came from the observation that I use awareness as a key component of my foresight used to engineer a solution to accomplish a future goal.

And that's the whole point … computers do not exhibit foresight. They and their programing and target acquisition are themselves exhibitions of the application of foresight, but until you can demonstrate otherwise, there is no reason to believe that a collection of logic gates can themselves possess awareness of future targets. That is how true and artificial intelligence are separated as I've already explained in my last post.

myself: "Is an engineer's intelligence as defined above a necessary condition for his blueprint's realization? Please answer this question with a simple yes or no as it is crucial for the following discussion."

Since you've added "awareness" to your claims then the answer is clearly "no".

Ok, finally, a straight forward answer. We both understand that awareness does exist. We are getting somewhere. Now, does this awareness have any effects? If you answer yes, then you have negated your previous assertion that "intelligence" is a useless concept to use as a condition.

I believe it is quite doubtful that digital computers are aware of anything, yet they are demonstrably capable of foresight.

No they are not demonstrably capable of foresight. They see nothing, they know nothing, they are aware of nothing. They are merely a collection of sufficiently organized logic gates, organized in such a manner so as to produce specific highly improbable effects that could only happen if previously targeted by a system with awareness of those future targets. IOW, computers which produce the *effects* of intelligence can only be created by previous artificial or true intelligence and as per my brief explanation of conservation of information will not be created absent the same or greater improbability of organization. IOW, according to COI, it may be that the improbability measure of true intelligence (the improbability necessary to attain awareness of future targets) can only be arrived at if true intelligence is a condition.

As I've already stated (and it is extremely relevant): "I remember that we have discussed this in the past and I had suggested that the improbability necessary to arrive (discover or create, whichever your preference) at rules of inference may offset the use of any application of those rules of inference within an AI system. Basically, the amount of inference able to be performed by a computer can produce no more information (as a measure on improbability) than the configuration necessary to discover those rules of inference and apply them in an AI configuration. Will an AI system discover the rules of inference if not programmed to do so? What is the minimum information (improbable organization) necessary to do so? Does this minimum information describe an intelligent system (artificial or not)? Excellent future research questions. Don't steal them "¦ they're mine."

Now, if you were to say that computers show the effects of previous foresight, then of course we are agreed and that is part of my point here.

myself: "Again, my question is: "Is an engineer's intelligence as defined above a necessary condition for his blueprint's realization?" Please answer this question with a simple yes or no as it is crucial for the following discussion."

My answer hasn't changed since you last asked

If your answer is "no" then please provide some evidence that an engineers blueprint and its fruition (let's say … for a calculator) will organize itself absent the influence of any previous foresight as I have previously defined it.

myself: "If we are merely attempting to detect the effects of previous intelligence, and the answer to the above question is "yes" then we have a starting point for detecting previous intelligence "” in the patterns that it leaves. And yes, using this methodology we would be able to detect both AI and "true" intelligence.

Am I being clear so far?"

I think you are saying that conscious awareness is necessary in order to have foresight. If that is what you are saying, I think it's pretty clear you are wrong.

Are you sure you are carrying a conversation with *me* because that's not what I'm trying to provide evidence for. That's part of my definition. I have defined foresight as awareness of future targets. Call it whatever you want, "magic sauce" … whatever … I call it foresight. And you have agreed above that it *does exist*. I am saying that foresight has effects and is a necessary condition for certain patterns.

BTW: the difference between "true" intelligence and "artificial" intelligence is that the former possess foresight in the sense of envisioning (being aware of) a future goal whereas the latter can only provide solutions to targets that are given to it by conscious or "true" intelligence and can not form a conscious understanding of its target. If AI discovers its own targets then it is because target aquisition is indeed one of the targets imposed upon it, however, the main difference is in conscious awareness of its target.

Yup, apparently that is what you meant. AI systems can of course "discover their own targets", but as far as we can tell, our computers are not consciously aware of what they are doing.

OK, that was a little easier than pulling a tooth. So now you understand and have no problem with the difference between "true" and "artificial" intelligence.

Furthermore, there are some phenomenon which have been solved by conscious beings (humans) yet may not be able to be solved algorithmically and thus there may be a fundamental difference between "true" intelligence and "artificial" intelligence. Right now I am thinking about Penrose non-periodic tilings.

Yes I'm familiar with Penrose's arguments, as well as their criticisms. It is an open question whether thought is dependent upon exotic (or undiscovered) physics, so Penrose (or some other proposal) could be right. But even Penrose's theory does not suggest that conscious awareness is necessarily causal of our non-algorithmic mental abilities; it accompanies it, but the abilities may well be independent (and derive from the Universal Platonic Logic).

I agree. That is definitely a possibility and should be a part of ongoing ID research. However, computers do not have foresight and can not yet perform non-algorithmically, yet humans have consciousness and may think non-algorithmically. There may be a very definite correlation or even a necessary pairing of consciousness and non-algorithmic abilities derived from platonic logic.

Oh, and I am not aware of any arguments against non-periodic tilings as being non-solvable by algorithm. all I've heard is "that's just what Penrose thinks." However, it makes clear sense to me. Could you please guide me to some significant criticisms. Thanks.

We already know that a great deal of our planning and foresight happens without any conscious involvement. You are not conscious of the plans you make while driving a car, for example. Sleepwalkers plan their movements without even knowing they're walking, and so on. So I think you are simply wrong to claim that human-like consciousness is known to be required in order make plans.

When we first learn to do some of these things we must put a lot of conscious effort … that is, we must learn while thinking about our actions and how to align them with our future desired goals. But yes, we do develop both muscle and other forms of memory after a considerable amount of practise. But, I'm not saying that awareness of future targets is required for everything.

myself: "Can you define gravity by not referring to its effects? Is gravity a field or a boson? What causes gravity? Are these scientific question and is the study of gravity scientific?"

Theories of gravity define gravity in terms of its effects, but the effects are always testable. Otherwise, we couldn't ever tell whether we were seeing the effects of gravity or something else. So in Newton's theory, he said that gravity was something that was always attractive, operated between any two masses, acted instantaneously over distance, caused acceleration proportional to a constant and the product of the masses over the square of the distance, and so on. Thus we could for the first time confirm that the same thing, "gravity", explained apples falling from trees and planetary motion!

Now contrast this with "intelligence". You wish to define "intelligence" by its effects, but unfortunately you can't characterize its effects in such a way that we can tell if we are seeing the result of "intelligence" or something else. You have no way to show that the same thing that enables human beings to design a car is what enabled the Designer to create life forms.

If there are certain features that require previous foresight of future targets, then you are wrong. There is a way and I believe that CSI and COI Theorem provide the beginnings to such a method. But first, we can start by answering a simple question. Is foresight a necessary condition for anything? Is foresight a necessary condition to see the fruition of an engineers blueprint or for the creation of an AI system?

Please provide evidence for your answer.

In light of our discussion, do you still stand by your assertion that attempting to discover the effects of conscious intelligence (which does actually exist as per the engineer's ability to envision a target and then engineer a solution to accomplish the goal) is a non-scientific investigation that a scientist is justified in disavowing as pseudo-science?

Bradford: It does appear though that even the discoverers themselves did not expect the sea urchin find and that surprise seems to mark the pattern of deep homology. The point being surprise is another way of indicating that a find would not have been predicted based on theoretical expectations.

One of the weaknesses on ID is that nothing surprises them. One of the strengths of science is that they are often surprised. If your theory is nothing more than rationalization then no possible data could ever surprise you. If your theory is clearly defined and makes specific claims then you are likely to eventually be surprised; some of these surprises might just be interesting bits of history but others might lead to significant improvements to the theory. No one thinks we already have all the answers, but the rapid progress being made is a strong endorsement of current methods.

Perhaps the biggest problem with ID is that all they ever seem to accomplish is to yell, "haha, some scientist was wrong about something, therefore we must be right." But every time science discovers they were wrong about something that means science has once again succeeded in expanding human knowledge and understanding.

It does appear though that even the discoverers themselves did not expect the sea urchin find and that surprise seems to mark the pattern of deep homology. The point being surprise is another way of indicating that a find would not have been predicted based on theoretical expectations.

I tried this question before, but never got an answer for it: Does any ID theory predict which genes have precursors dating how far back? For example, I never saw a prediction made by ID about the 'sea urchin find'. Only general statements like: We will find deep homology– which, by the way, is not what I think the surprise is about.

So, just for my curiosity: Does ID theory make any prediction about which genes have precursors dating how far back? And does it make any predictions on when novel genes were actually developed i.e. for which genes will we not find this 'deep homology'? Or are all predictions of the type: "The publishing biologists were surprised at their findings, but we teleologists would not have been."

As I wrote elsewhere:

And I can tell you one thing: If, for example, a couple of years ago, a teleological researcher would have predicted that comb jelly fish and not sponges were the older group of metazoans, then about two months ago all of a sudden the world of biological researchers would have perked their ears up and everybody would have wanted one of those teleologists on their groups to help them guide their research.

Piattelli-Palmarini: Look, when Sherman stresses that the sea urchin has, in-expressed, the genes for the eyes and for antibodies (genes that are well known and fully active in later species), how can we not agree with him that canonical neo-Darwinism cannot begin to explain such facts?

Bradford: The point being surprise is another way of indicating that a find would not have been predicted based on theoretical expectations.

Piattelli-Palmarini said, "cannot begin to explain". Canonical Neo-Darwinism *predicts* that all traits are incremental modifications of preexisting traits. But unraveling history always involves surprises.

For those interested in sea urchins:

Sea Urchin Genome Confirms Kinship to Humans and Other Vertebrates: researchers describe the 814 million DNA bases that make up the genome of the purple sea urchin, Strongylocentrotus purpuratus. Its 23,500 genes suggest that these algae-eating invertebrates have more complex immune and sensory systems than researchers had appreciated.

Who could have imagined that genes in humans would have antecedents in precursor genes?

It does appear though that even the discoverers themselves did not expect the sea urchin find and that surprise seems to mark the pattern of deep homology. The point being surprise is another way of indicating that a find would not have been predicted based on theoretical expectations.