[theturtlemoves]

I've always had the feeling that AI researchers want to build their own human without having to change diapers being part of the process. Just skip to adulthood please, and learn to drive a car without having experience in bumping into things and hurting yourself.

> Language doesn't just describe reality; it creates it.

I wonder if this is a statement from the discussed paper or from the blog author. Haven't found the original paper yet, but this blog post very much makes me want to read it.

[ta20240528]

> Language doesn't just describe reality; it creates it.

I never under stand these kinds of statements.

Does the sun not exist until we have a word for it, did "under the rock" not exist for dinosaurs?

[keiferski]

I think create is the wrong word choice here. Shaping reality is a better one, as it doesn't hold the implication that before language, nothing existed.

Think of it this way, though: the divisions that humans make between objects in the world are largely linguistic ones. For example, we say that the Earth is such-and-such an ecosystem with certain species occupying it. But this is more like a convenient shorthand, not a totally accurate description of reality. A more accurate description would be something like, ever-changing organisms undergo this complex process that we call evolution, and are all continually changing, so much so that the species concept is not really that clear, once you dig into it.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/species/

Where it really gets interesting, IMO, is when these divisions (which originally were mostly just linguistic categories) start shaping what's actually in the world. The concept of property is a good example. Originally it's just a legal term, but over time, it ends up reshaping the actual face of the earth, ecosystems, wars, migrations, on and on.

[mcv]

I'm immediately thinking about Sapiens, by Harari. One of the big points of that book is that much of our reality is made up. Countries, laws, corporations, property, -isms, marriage, and many other things only exist because we all agree to believe in them. These are part of our shared subjective reality, created by our words and actions, and they will cease to exist the moment everybody stops believing in them.

[ta20240528]

> Property … Originally it's just a legal term

No, see what happens when apes, hyena's, and animals from dozens of other species try steal each others food.

"mine" and "yours" existed long before language.

[keiferski]

Sorry I should have been more specific. I meant privately owned land, not just personal property. You could argue that territorial “possession” of land is a thing animals have, but the concept of property goes considerably further than that IMO.

[cpa]

The sun can mean different things to different people. We usually think of it as the physical star, but for some ancient civilizations it may have been seen as a person or a god. Living with these different representations can, in a very real way, shape the reality around you. If you did not have a word for freedom, would as many desire it?

[sanxiyn]

I am not sure how your sun example relates. Language is not whole of reality, but it is clearly part of reality. Memory engram of Coca-Cola is encoded in billions of human brains all over the world, and they are arrangement of atoms.

[rolisz]

There are some folks (like Donald Hoffman) that believe that consciousness is what creates reality. He believes consciousness is the base layer of reality and then we make up physical reality.

[sharikous]

> I've always had the feeling that AI researchers want to build their own human without having to change diapers being part of the process. Just skip to adulthood please, and learn to drive a car without having experience in bumping into things and hurting yourself.

I partially agree, but the idea about AI is that you need to bump into things and hurt yourself only once. Then you have a good driver you can replicate at will

[degamad]

I think this might be the paper being referenced:

Melanie Mitchell (2021) "Why AI is Harder Than We Think." https://arxiv.org/abs/2104.12871

That sentence is not from this paper.

[namro]

*skip to slavery