Humanity's survival is off the point, I think the proper question would be: "Could individuals thrive without understanding that which would enable them to do so?", in which case I would argue they couldn't because they would no longer hold the mastery needed to advance themselves.Or could humanity survive by existing within the dark without having to know the behind the scenes extras? — JupiterJess
I think Dennet makes a point. We can use machines, technologies and treatments and the whole panoply of what science and technology has given us and then have people thinking that the science is "fake", bogus or a political view.Is having complete knowledge important? Or could humanity survive by existing within the dark without having to know the behind the scenes extras? If this happens what would a post-intelligent design world look like? — JupiterJess
The real danger that’s facing us is we’ve lost respect for truth and facts. People have discovered that it’s much easier to destroy reputations for credibility than it is to maintain them. It doesn’t matter how good your facts are, somebody else can spread the rumour that you’re fake news. We’re entering a period of epistemological murk and uncertainty that we’ve not experienced since the middle ages.
"We’re entering a period of epistemological murk and uncertainty that we’ve not experienced since the middle ages."
I think that Dennett's own philosophical works might be entering into an area of post-intelligent design. — Colin B
Dennett asks us to turn our backs on what is glaringly obvious—that in consciousness we are immediately aware of real subjective experiences of color, flavor, sound, touch, etc. that cannot be fully described in neural terms even though they have a neural cause (or perhaps have neural as well as experiential aspects). And he asks us to do this because the reality of such phenomena is incompatible with the scientific materialism that in his view sets the outer bounds of reality. He is, in Aristotle’s words, “maintaining a thesis at all costs.”[/url]
— Thomas Nagel
.. .by the end of this brilliant book, the one thing that hasn’t been explained is consciousness. How does first-person experience – the experience you are having now, reading these words – arise from the electrochemical interactions of neurons? — Steve Poole
[Dennett]: The real danger that’s facing us is we’ve lost respect for truth and facts. . — ssu
What is the actual, practical difference between some very few exceptional individuals understanding how everything works and no one individual at all understanding how everything works, even within any given science? — John
Could individuals thrive without understanding that which would enable them to do so?", in which case I would argue they couldn't because they would no longer hold the mastery needed to advance themselves. — Noblosh
But they all reject, or at least deeply question, the fundamental tenet of his life's work: — Wayfarer
I think Dennett is exaggerating in saying that in the past the best minds could understand almost everything. Perhaps it might have been true regarding the sciences, but not also literature, the arts, history, philosophy, metaphysics, languages, and so on. And even if a very few of the very best minds could understand "almost everything"; what import could that have for the rest of 'ignorant' humanity? — John
AI doesn't serve humanity, AI is a toolset. Not to mention an utopia is irrealizable...Yep, individuals would become overly reliant on AI. So it would look similar to communism with everyone having equal talents assuming all of the AI is of the same software. — JupiterJess
There's no way that anyone understands everything in any field of consequence. That's certainly been true in Information Technology for a long time, even without genetic algorithms and deep learning. The field is constantly expanding, and nobody has the time to learn everything. — Marchesk
Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon's Jeff Bezos believe we are five to 10 years away from computers being able to understand everything that's written in Wikipedia, not just translate.
Love it or hate it, phenomena like this exhibit the heart of the power of the Darwinian idea. An impersonal, unreflective, robotic, mindless little scrap of molecular machinery is the ultimate basis of all the agency, and hence meaning, and hence consciousness, in the universe.
We are survival machines—robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes. This is a truth which still fills me with astonishment.
Is having complete knowledge important? — JupiterJess
nobody has the time to learn everything — Marchesk
what would be the difference even if they did — JupiterJess
Of course it is.Dennett seems to think this is a use it or lose it scenario. — JupiterJess
A prescient warning is contained in this observation.AI doesn't serve humanity, AI is a toolset. — Noblosh
Information control is mind control. To what extent is information being controlled on your social networks?There are a lot of heavy hitters that believe that the Internet is on the verge of becoming a real intelligence. — Wayfarer
I don't see how. Intelligence is a measure of memory, knowledge, and controlled/automatic processing capacity.intelligence and information processing are fundamentally different in some basic way. — Wayfarer
Nothing to see here. Move along.this isn't something new or novel — StreetlightX
It is that background ability to assess and equate and impute meaning - to say that 'this means that', that 'because of this, then that must be', that strikes me as being foundational to the operations of rational intelligence. — Wayfarer
But regardless, computers are ultimately the instruments of human intelligence; and I am still dubious that they will ever know what all (or any) of that information means. — Wayfarer
So what is the agenda behind attempts to equate animal nonverbal modelling with human verbal modelling? Could it be to justify animal-like behaviour on the part of human beings? — Galuchat
Science [in the form espoused by Dennett et al] is a form of culture in which life denies itself and refuses itself any value. It is a practical negation of life, which develops into a theoretical negation in the form of ideologies that reduces all possible knowledge to that of science, such as the human sciences whose very objectivity deprives them of their object: what value do statistics have faced with suicide, what do they say about the anguish and the despair that produce it? These ideologies have invaded the university, and are precipitating it to its destruction by eliminating life from research and teaching.
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